By Elaine Carlson

I have been listening to the Public Service Announcements telling how important our census is and encouraging everyone to return the census questionnaire. I looked online but now I forget if the U. S. Census Bureau says they sent them out in March or April. I almost want to contact them to ask why they didn't send a questionnaire to me and my husband. 

It is just that I am sure they mailed the form and I know why we didn't get it. I say that because the last time around (the 2010 Census) we also did not get their questionnaire . Both times they sent them to our street address. But we have a mail box and don't get our mail at our house.

In 2010 I called the Census 800 Number. A machine rather than a person answered. After I pushed the number to say I was contacting them because I didn't get the form the voice asked if I was calling about residents at …. and told our address. I said yes and then the robo voice said that a form will be sent. And real quick the call was over (that was the fastest hangup I have ever experienced).

At first I was disappointed about the lack of a chance to talk to a person to explain our problem but I ended up being mad at the U. S. Census Bureau. Two times they sent out a questionnaire and both were returned to them undelivered. When the second one was returned they could have (should have?) realized that at least one person lived at that address. Presumably the same technology that let them know our street address from our phone number also gave them a call log and of course they knew my address. But they didn't return my call or send out a census worker.

Every time after census results are released there are numerous complaints that significant numbers of people are missing from the count. It must be tempting for the U. S. Census Bureau to blame the public for the inaccuracies but I hope they don't.

The U. S. Census Bureau used bad judgment to rely so much on automation in 2010. I know it is a lot cheaper to not have a Customer Service phone number answered by people. And the money saved by just doing a census with a questionnaire that is suppose to be mailed back was substantial. But how did anyone think those streamlining efforts wouldn't cause a host of problems?

The government reviewed the 2010 Census and made some changes. First off this time callers to their help-line can now speak to a person. The phone still has instructions to push a number for this and for that and tells people how to get information from their website. But there IS a number to push to speak to a person. And also on their website they say they are going to send out census workers to all the residences where no one has returned a questionnaire (and I assume, or hope, for the ones that were returned to them undelivered).

I feel guilty about throwing stones at the U. S. Census Bureau. They have a difficult job and are in a bind. I am pretty certain that they realize that no matter how many Public Service Advertisements they issue some (a lot of?) people are simply not going to cooperate and will not be counted.

But basically there is nothing they can do. Perhaps a good way to respond to a bad count would be to insert an estimate of the under-counted into the statistics (a fudge factor if you will). But they are not allowed to do that --- even if it is a very good estimate and would make the final count more accurate.

The U. S. Census Law is specific --- the Census has to be a direct head count---NO indirect methods can be used. And because they are getting away from the idea of having census workers walking through neighborhoods to conduct their count and instead relying on questionnaires that are to be mailed back the results of last time and now are going to end up being worse than they were in prior years.

Those census workers out in the field will have a house on their route that never has anyone at home whenever they come by. And it looks like a normal house and it easy to see that people live there. They keep seeing such houses. Those workers don't want to go back to the base and report that they only were able document a dozen people living in an area of four streets with tightly packed homes. So they enter into their log books information about the residents they gleam from other people who live or work in the area or they outright make up information that seems reasonable.

But the census workers in the office won't be able to make up information and fill out questionnaires for the many people who don't send in their completed forms. They don't have the same opportunity as the people in the field to skirt the law. And there will be just too many.

That Direct Counting Imperative is unfortunate because there are a lot of good ways to conduct a census that would lead to a good (or better) result.

Cities maintain Property Tax Records with a listing of the houses, apartments and other buildings within their borders. And schools can tell them how many students they have. Those tax and school records provide hard numbers which can be used with a few assumptions to come up with an initial population count.

Then the bureau can gather more information for the statisticians working for them. Their workers can count all of the cars that are out on the street at night and count the cars on the road at different times of the day. A lot can be learned from those numbers. For instance if on weekdays they observe heavy traffic between 6:30 and 7:30 AM they know a lot of people are going to work.

The statisticians can decide if the number of parked cars and the traffic patterns they found are realistic for the initial population count. And then make any adjustment they think are necessary.

The requirement to count all the bodies (oops – people) is really ridiculous. It is the same politicians who are against mail-in ballots who are adamentally opposed to any efforts to changing the way the census is conducted.