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<\/a>Lowenthal says that the 2020 Census is facing a \u201cconfluence of unprecedented factors\u201d amounting to \u201ca perfect storm.\u201d The Census Bureau\u2019s prior director, John Thompson, resigned in May of this year, and the agency is \u201cfacing a leadership vacuum at a time when it is faced with critical decisions\u201d on its methods and use of resources,\u201d according to Gupta.<\/p>\n
In addition to the nomination of a \u201cqualified, non-partisan candidate to lead the Census Bureau,\u201d Gupta says the agency is in dire need of more adequate funding.<\/p>\n
Lowenthal says that funding for the 2020 Census has been so far \u201cinsufficient, uncertain and frequently late.\u201d Following the 2010 Census, Congress for the first time set a cap on census costs. The Census Bureau was directed to spend no more on the 2020 Census than it did on the 2010 Census; following that, says Lowenthal, Congress \u201cshortchanged the census in annual funding bills throughout much of this decade.\u201d Lawmakers later decided that the 2020 Census would in fact receive less funding than the 2010 Census.<\/p>\n
Congress failed to allocate sufficient funds in 2017, according to Lowenthal, and now the Trump administration has requested far less funding in 2018 than the Census Bureau needs, she says. As things stand now, there will be fewer than half as many temporary census takers in the 2020 Census as there were in 2010.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe window of opportunity to right this ship is closing fast,\u201d says Lowenthal. But, she says, \u201cCongress can demonstrate leadership by adjusting the budget cuts upward in advance starting this fall for the next three years.\u201d<\/p>\n
The lack of adequate funding has already had real consequences, says Arturo Vargas, the executive director of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO) Educational Fund.<\/p>\n
The Census Bureau failed to complete a Spanish-language test census that was planned for Puerto Rico, and is also failing to test and implement methods for more accurately counting people in remote and rural areas.<\/p>\n
The agency also won\u2019t be testing certain local outreach and messaging strategies to get people to complete their census forms, Vargas says.<\/p>\n
Outreach strategies have become more crucial among some marginalized communities. \u201cWe know that there is increasingly a climate of fear among immigrant communities and immigrant households,\u201d he says, due to the current political atmosphere and an uptick in anti-immigrant rhetoric under the Trump administration.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have seen immigrant families opting out of participating in programs in which they have any kind of contact with government, including health care programs and school lunch programs,\u201d says Vargas. \u201cAs a result, we believe it will be even more difficult to encourage these immigrant populations to participate\u201d in the census.<\/p>\n
Indeed, it\u2019s groups like \u201cpeople of color, low-income families, people with disabilities, and limited English proficient individuals\u201d who would be most affected by an inadequately funded census, according to John C. Yang, the executive director of Asian Americans Advancing Justice. \u201cAny gap in testing and any gap in discovering deficiencies\u201d in methodology, he says, would have the greatest impact on these communities.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The 2020 Census is off to a rocky start, with crucial preparations already delayed or falling to the wayside, largely a result of inadequate funding from Congress. A New America Media report by Anna Challet. Some of the nation\u2019s oldest civil rights organizations, while fearing the worst, say there\u2019s still time for Congress and the…<\/p>\n