A massive effort is underway to make sure that every person gets counted in the 2020 Census. It starts now with recruiting and hiring people to go door to door, and continues with a push to reach hard to count populations.
“We want to count every single person,” said Keith Goralski, a spokesperson for the US Census Bureau. “We want a complete and accurate count of the population counting everyone only once and in the right place.”
The US Census Bureau is looking to hire 500,000 people across the county, including 28,000 in Connecticut, to get it done. These temporary jobs pay $21 to $25 an hour.
The results are tied to billions of dollars in federal funding.
“$675 billion that is available every year and that funding is based upon census data,” said Goralski. “That funding is for snap, for road repairs, for fire houses.”
In Connecticut, that funding amounts to nearly $11 billion.
This is the first time you can fill out the census questionnaire online, even on your phone. There’s also an 800 number.
Local
At the Prosser Library in Bloomfield, Library Director Elizabeth Lane said there will be extra staff on hand to help, especially to help reach populations concerned about things like immigration status.
“A lot of people don’t have internet access at home,” said Lane. “A lot of people don’t have the information literacy skills to navigate these types of websites. If people feel uncomfortable with any of those questions we can just skip that and move onto the other ones that again will get them counted so that those federal dollars come back to Connecticut.”
“Personally identifiable information for addresses and for people is stripped from the data that is provided to the public,” said Goralski.
Tuesday was a national recruiting day for the census, though recruiting continues through the spring. Click here to learn more.
