Hand Delivery of Census Questionnaire launches in rural Texas
Houston County Courier
WASHINGTON DC - Here we come. Many rural Texans will begin receiving their 2010 Census forms this week as trained Census workers begin the hand-delivery of a million questionnaires to households without numbered street ad-dresses and to those in other areas, such as the coastal areas ravaged by hurricanes and the colonias along the Texas-Mexico border. Census workers hit the country roads starting March 1 to begin the first major operation of the 2010 Census: the enumeration of an estimated 25 million rural residents across the country and almost 4 million in Texas. The operation runs through the month of March and marks the beginning of the 2010 Census questionnaire delivery. Although it will cover al-most two-thirds of the geogra-phy of Texas, almost 90 per-cent of Texas’ 8.2 million households will likely receive the Census questionnaire by mail, the least expensive mode of delivery, around the third week in March. The questionnaires are hand-delivered to rural areas to update hard-to-register addresses and to ensure that each household receives a questionnaire. These on-site visits are ne-cessary because the Census Bureau relies on counting in-dividuals at specific physical addresses to prevent counting people twice. Household occupants will be asked to fill out the answers to the 10 questions and return the completed form by mail. It’s important to note that Census workers will not ask for any information during this operation other than to ask you to complete the questionnaire and to mail it back. If no one is home, the enumerator will leave the questionnaire in a plastic bag on the doorknob or nearby. “We’re going to bring it right to your door,” said Ga-briel Sanchez, Dallas Regional Census Director. “It will either come in the mail or we are going to take the extra step of delivering it in person.” In Texas, the so-called up-date enumeration will involve mobilizing perhaps 6,000 enumerators and support staff to cover the four-week opera-tion. They will deliver question-naires to more than 1 million Texas households. You can identify official Census workers by their gov-ernment identification badge, the confidentiality notice in their possession and the ques-tionnaire. Some workers may also be carrying a Census tote bag. Census workers in this oper-ation will not ask for any in-formation and will not ask to come inside your house. Census Day is April 1, the day that the law requires you to be counted at the address where to live and sleep most of the time. In mid-March, the Census Bureau will mail question-naires to 145 million house-holds in the United States, the largest mass mailing in the history of the county and the least expensive way to reach 90 percent of those who live in the United States. The Census is especially im-portant to farm communities and rural communities. While Texas’ overall population grew by 12.7 percent from 2000 to 2005, nearly twice the national rate, its rural popula-tion grew much slower and its proportion of the overall population declined. Of Texas’ estimated 24.8 million people, fewer than 4 million live in rural areas. Moreover, 93 rural counties that lacked a metropolitan area lost population between 2000 and 2005, according to Texas Comptroller of Public Ac-counts study of U.S. Census data. Because congressional re-presentation is entirely depen-dent on the Census count, and the disbursement of federal dollars is based, in part, on population figures, getting an accurate Census count is vital for rural Texas and its many communities. In 2008 alone, the federal government spent billions of dollars on rural and farm pro-grams, including $909 million in crop insurance, $42 million in livestock compensation programs, $279 million in crop disaster assistance and $21 million in rural rent assistance. Rural areas also present spe-cial difficulties in getting a full and accurate count. Far-flung homesteads are often difficult to locate and migrant farm workers can be difficult to in-clude because of the mobile nature of their livelihoods. Promoting the Census in ru-ral Texas is one way to ensure the continued economic vitali-ty of one of the nation’s most important agricultural and cul-tural areas. It’s also safe. All informa-tion remains strictly confiden-tial: Census data is not shared with any individual or other government agency. So encourage your neighbors to fill out the Census questionnaire when it arrives in mid-March. Mail it back by the first week of April and a Census worker will not knock on your door in May.
|
