LIHU‘E — The federal government’s attempt to orchestrate a head count of hundreds of millions of residents to better allocate hundreds of billions of dollars has reached Kaua‘i’s shores. The census, held once every 10 years, is already underway on
LIHU‘E — The federal government’s attempt to orchestrate a head count of hundreds of millions of residents to better allocate hundreds of billions of dollars has reached Kaua‘i’s shores.
The census, held once every 10 years, is already underway on the Garden Isle and elsewhere, with residents having received their questionnaires in the mail or posted to their doors in recent weeks.
The surveys — 10 questions about the number of residents in a given home and their ages and ethnicities — are compiled by the U.S. Department of Commerce, which uses the data to apportion congressional districts and distribute funds, census officials said this week.
Hawai‘i, which had one of the nation’s lowest response rates at just 60 percent in 2000, lost out on hundreds of millions of dollars in the intervening decade.
Former Mayors Maryanne Kusaka and JoAnn Yukimura, both members of the Complete Count Committee, told the Kaua‘i County Council Wednesday that they hope every resident on the island is counted this time around.
The expensive cleanup after Hurricanes ‘Iwa and ‘Iniki could have been further supplemented by Federal Emergency Management Agency funds had Hawai‘i been better represented in previous censi, officials said.
The council approved a certificate declaring April 1, 2010, “Census Day” on Kaua‘i.
The census is designed to count the homeless as well as noncitizens or undocumented residents, U.S. Census Bureau Partnership Specialist Marilyn Paguirigan told the council. The questionnaire is available in multiple languages, and information provided through the census is by law completely confidential.
Those filling out the forms should not fear arrest or deportation, or retribution for back taxes or unpaid traffic tickets, because confidential census data cannot be shared with third-party government agencies like the Immigration and Naturalization Service or Internal Revenue Service, Paguirigan said.
Census workers who share sensitive information could be subject to prison time or hefty fines, she said.
The council certificate set the stage for a week of census-related activities. A “Hawai‘i Counts” Road Tour is slated to start Monday with a kickoff at the county building, traveling to Anahola, Kapa‘a, Princeville, Hanalei, Kilauea, Po‘ipu, Koloa, Kalaheo, Salt Pond, ‘Ele‘ele and Waimea through next week in an effort to raise awareness.
Paguirigan said those with P.O. boxes will receive a copy on their doors soon, and said only those who do not respond to the initial attempts — each questionnaire has a bar-code to identify those that are returned — will have an “enumerator” knocking on their door up to six times at the cost to federal taxpayers of $25 apiece.
Nationally, every 1 percent increase in initial response rate would save $80 million, she said, and every person missed by the census process will cost the state between $1,200 and $2,500 every year for the next decade.
For more information, visit www.2010census.gov.
• Michael Levine, assistant news editor, can be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 252) or mlevine@kauaipubco.com.
