“The actual Enumeration shall be made within three Years after the first Meeting of the Congress of the United States, and within every subsequent Term of ten Years, in such Manner as they shall by Law direct.” —from Article I, Sec. 2, of the United States Constitution.
The United States Census happens only once every decade, and such an infrequent schedule might leave some people unsure how to respond to the regular counting of American citizens.
Partnership specialist Bryson Carroll with the U.S. Census Bureau said people will begin getting mailings from the census this week.
“People will start getting invitations in the mail between March 12 and March 20, so here starting this week,” he said. “April 1 is actual Census Day across the country, and then people have a chance to respond to the census all the way up to July 31.”
Carroll said participation in the census is not optional.
“It’s mandated by the Constitution and it’s required by law,” he said.
People will receive an “invitation” to participate in the census in the mail or by direct delivery, he said.
“You’ll either get something in the mail, or if you kind of live out in the country, you’ll receive something that someone will actually drop off,” he said. “They’ll give you the invitation to respond, which will allow you to respond like everyone else, but they’ll also include the paper questionnaire with that as well. So it just depends on your address.”
Americans may respond either by mail, phone or online, Carroll said.
“That initial letter will have instructions on how to respond. We’re really trying to encourage online and phone participation, because we get the data coming in a little bit quicker that way,” he said. “It’ll have instructions about how you can answer online. It’ll include an ink code that you can use to respond online or by phone. If you lose that code for whatever reason, you can always respond using your physical address.”
Data from the census is used to allocate federal funding and to determine an area’s political representation.
“The Census helps to inform how billions of federal dollars are allocated to communities across the country,” Carroll said. “All of that is based on population count. That’s for things like housing, to prepare for emergencies, and it also includes schools, roads and hospitals. It also determines seats that the state receives in Congress on the federal level, and also affects state and local governments and how they redraw boundaries for congressional districts, state legislative districts, school districts, making sure that we adapt for population shifts.”
What questions will be on the census?
“So it’s going to ask your name, your date of birth and a phone number to verify identity, then it’s going to ask, ‘How many people live in this household?’ Age of the people there, race of the people there, sex of the people there, Hispanic origin, whether you own or rent your home, and your relationship to everyone within the household. Those are the only questions that will be included,” he said.
While Carroll said he understands some people might find certain questions sensitive, such as those about race or gender, the Census Bureau encourages everyone to answer all the questions.
“We do have a toll-free phone number that people can call if they have questions or concerns about a question and get some answers there or some guidance, but we really want to make sure everyone answers every single question on the questionnaire,” he said, adding that if a person doesn’t find an appropriate answer on the multiple-choice list, many questions will have a write-in option. “There will be standard selections for some of those questions, but there will be write-ins on some of those as well, if someone decides to choose that.”
Help filling out the census is available both online and by telephone, he said.
“You can always go to 2020census.gov,” Carroll said. “There’s a lot of information there. People can actually access the online response there. There will be a link there and plenty of information. Or you can call 1-844-330-2020, an English line, or 1-844-468-2020 for the line in Spanish.”
And if you need a good-paying, albeit temporary job, the Census Bureau might have something for you as well.
“We are still hiring. You can apply at 2020census.gov/jobs,” Carroll said. “I just checked the rate for Scurry County on our Census website, and those jobs start at $21.50 an hour. The majority of those jobs will be the Enumerator position. Those will be the people going out to knock doors and collect information from those who haven’t yet responded to the Census. About the middle of May is when that operation will start, so there will be some time for self-response, but in the middle of May, we’ll start sending people out to collect information from people who haven’t responded.”
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