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Aug. 5, 2020 updates for the Census 2020 Hard to Count/Response Rate map

 

Census Bureau Announcement Means the 2020 Count Will Be Rushed; New Online Maps Show Which Areas Will be Impacted Most

This week the Census Bureau confirmed they plan to cut short the timeframe for self-response enumeration & door-knocking follow-up for the 2020 Census, and will expedite the critical data improvement, processing, and review activities that take place after the count is completed. This exacerbates the risks to a fair and accurate count.

In April the Bureau extended the 2020 Census schedule due to the COVID-19 crisis:

  • enumeration would continue through Oct. 31, and
  • the Dept. of Commerce asked Congress to extend the deadline for submitting apportionment census counts until April 2021 (the statutory deadline is Dec 31, 2020).

Now the Bureau wants to cease counting on Sept. 30 and rush the preparation of apportionment counts to provide them by the end of the year.

Unless the Bureau restores the extended timeframe and Congress acts accordingly, areas of the country with already low self-response rates face greater risks they will not be counted fairly and accurately. This is a problem especially for hard-to-reach communities with concentrations of people of color, immigrants, people with disabilities, young children, rural populations, and other groups that have been historically undercounted.

We have updated our online HTC/Response Rate map to highlight these areas. Other online maps, such as a new feature at Social Explorer, also provide information for census stakeholders so they can plan their outreach and educational efforts.

How far is your community behind its 2010 Census response rate?

The HTC/Response Rate map now includes two new features:

  1. a Compare option to visualize if your community's 2020 self-response rate (or county, congressional district, city, or state) is behind its 2010 rate. If it hasn't met its 2010 rate, a greater share of homes will need to be visited by census takers than in 2010, which will be harder to do if the enumeration timeframe is cut short. See the screenshot at right; and
  2. for each area on the map, we show how many percentage points the location is behind or ahead of its 2010 rate, and also show the number of households that still need to be visited by census takers because they haven't yet self-responded. More info below.

Here's an example that visualizes counties in New York State tan-to-red that haven't met their 2010 rates (some are 20 points or more behind 2010, such as Lewis County).

Note that in New York, no counties have met or surpassed their 2010 rates. If they had, they would be shown in green on the map. Areas in green are in a better place than in 2010 in terms of the door-knocking follow-up effort, though even these areas may still have relatively low rates.

KUNM, New Mexico's public radio station, featured our Compare map in a recent report on the shortened census timeframe. Talking Points Memo and The Daily Yonder also featured articles this week about how a rushed census timeframe will disproportionately impact rural areas of the country.

At right is the detailed information displayed at the map for Lewis County, NY, explaining that its current 2020 self-response rate of 42% is more than 24 points behind its 2010 rate. In Lewis, an estimated 8,300 households have filled out the census form on their own, but another 11,000+ housing units need to be visited by census takers either to count the people in those households in person, or to determine if the units are vacant or should otherwise be removed from the list. Lewis County is represented in Congress by Rep. Elise Stefanik, whose district overall is more than 12 points behind its 2010 rate.

Already many stakeholder groups, professional societies, philanthropic funders of census outreach & education, and elected officials have urged the Census Bureau and Congress to work together to make sure we take the time needed to successfully complete the 2020 Census. A decade's worth of political representation, government funding, and more hang in the balance.

Links to earlier updates

Make sure to follow us on Twitter at @Census2020Map !

The HTC 2020 map is a work in progress. Other recent updates and enhancements are described here:

  • July 31, 2020: The door-knocking count is starting early in more states; our maps show which areas will be impacted most if it ends early.
  • July 24, 2020: Door-knocking enumeration begins in selected areas; our map shows where and what to expect. Also updates on latest response rate analysis & recent online census self-response highlights.
  • July 15, 2020: New "Data Trends" feature added to the mapping site, with dynamic trendlines & animated map of response rate trajectories. Estimated response rates by state legislative district also added to the map.
  • June 25, 2020: Dynamic new metric to tract response rates at the tract, city, & county levels. Examples of other resources analyzing the latest 2020 Census self-response rates, and our latest analysis of the nation's response rate trends.
  • May 27, 2020: Update/Leave operations have resumed in 42 states & Puerto Rico; rates are increasing slowly nationwide but bright spots highlight importance of census outreach to continue to boost response; tracts with lowest response rates are very different than tracts with highest rates.
  • May 14, 2020: New map search feature for Area Census Offices (where the Update/Leave operation is resuming), our latest self-response rate analysis (Week7), & links to other projects analyzing self-response rates.
  • May 6, 2020: News about where the Update/Leave operation is resuming, and our latest self-response rate analyses (Weeks 4, 5, & 6).
  • April 13, 2020: Week 3 Response Rate Analysis; Trendlines Added to the Map.
  • April 7, 2020: Week 2 Response Rate analysis; Tribal Lands added to the map.
  • April 3, 2020: Census 2020 HTC map news: "Census Day" Self-Response Bump; Data Q&A.
  • March 31, 2020: Week 1 Response Rate analysis.
  • March 23, 2020: Update on mapping self-response rates, with emphasis on the 2020 progress bar that fills in daily after the latest rates are published, easy share/embed options for your map, and some notes on the data.
  • March 19 2020: In a joint statement with our colleagues at the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights (LCCHR), we highlighted the importance of a fair and accurate 2020 Census as the coronavirus challenges grow, and lifted up the resources available at our HTC 2020 map to help inspire Americans to fill out the 2020 Census form on their own. Self-responding helps ensure that the Census Bureau collects reliable data about the nation's population. And self-responding is a way to practice social distancing because it avoids a knock at your door later on from a census taker.
  • March 2020: The HTC map is now focused on census self-response rates. All the former info at the map is still there. But now that census mailings are going out, the map has been updated to reflect 2010 response rates in anticipation of integrating 2020 real-time rates after March 20. NB: the map not only displays response rates for each state, county, and tract, but also include a bar chart in the map's left-hand panel that shows the 2010 rate (and 2000, for historical context) for now. The 2020 column in the bar chart is empty, but it will start to go up after March 20. How quickly and how far it rises depends on local census stakeholders!
  • February 2020: New data on the risk of undercounting young children, in collaboration with the Population Reference Bureau. For more info, visit PRB's website.
  • January 2020: To help promote the official start of the 2020 Census in Alaska, we added a special "It Starts Here" (in Toksook Bay, AK) graphic on the map. Updates in January also included new 2014-2018 population estimates for tracts, counties, states, legislative districts, and more.
  • December 2019: New advanced tract search feature, statewide maps of Census Bureau contact strategies, and more.
  • November 2019: Comprehensive information for all 2020 Census contact techniques combined in one place at the HTC 2020 map, so census stakeholders can more easily inform local residents about what to expect when the 2020 decennial census takes place. Also see the CUNY Center for Urban Research website for a state-by-state analysis.
  • October 2019: Updates to TEA designations; the latest examples of groups using the HTC map across the country; enhancing the HTC metrics with the Census Bureau's "low response score", the Urban Institute's projections of undercount by state; & more.
  • August 2019: In-Field Address Canvassing areas & stats on the map; organizations that are using the HTC map for local grant assistance; new examples of linking to and/or embedding the HTC map.
  • July 2019: new feature to highlight tracts based on share of households without internet access; a list of other census maps nationwide, and more.
  • June 2019: Census contacts by state/county; census tract search feature.
  • April 2019: customized printing, data downloads, and more.
  • March 2019: mapping Type of Enumeration Areas (TEA) and Area Census Offices (ACOs)
  • January 2019: new ACS data for the 2013-17 period (including internet access), new legislative info, public library locations, and tribal lands added to the map.

If you haven't signed up for our HTC 2020 map updates, please do so here.

We look forward to hearing your suggestions for improving the map. Please contact the Mapping Service at the CUNY Graduate Center with your feedback.

Thanks!


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