Representatives of the Census Bureau 2010 assure that participation in the population count is safe and will benefit everyone.
"The data collected during the population count is used, among other things, to determine the number of representatives the city gets in Congress and the State Legislature, as well as the size of each of our 51 City Council districts," said Stacey Cumberbatch, New York City director for Census 2010, during a press conference for ethnic media organized at the CUNY School of Journalism. "But they also determine how much federal funding New York City gets each year. This money funds things like health care, housing, education or senior services."
Cumberbatch also mentioned that last year New York received $22 billion from federal funds to sponsor various social programs (that's $2,700 per person). The amount was distributed based on the statistics from the Decennial Census 2000. Had the figures been higher the City would have received more money.
Every 10 years, during the population count, the census workers face the problem of trying to collect questionnaires from certain groups that prefer to stay in hiding – immigrants, especially undocumented immigrants, are among them.
More than 3 million of the 8.3 million New Yorker residents are immigrants. According to Guillermo Linares, Commissioner of the Mayor's Office of Immigrant Affairs of the City of New York who was present at the conference, half a million of them are undocumented. "These people are an integral part of our city. If they are not counted, we'll compromise our safety, well-being and health. These numbers will also have a huge impact on our city for the next 10 years, until the next census is conducted," he said.
"Undocumented immigrants take the bus, the train, they go to the hospital and their children go to school," said assistant regional Census manager Allison Cenac. "We need them to be included in funding so that we can serve them well," she added.
She emphasized that the information collected on the questionnaires is confidential and that the Census Bureau will not disclose it to any other federal agency. Additionally, the Census worker who releases personal data from a questionnaire is subject to five years in prison and a fine of up to $200,000.
There is no question regarding the respondent's immigration status on the census survey form. This year, for the first time in history, some questionnaires will be in Spanish and will be mailed out to households in regions inhabited by the Latino population.
Apart from that, individuals who speak Spanish, Russian, Chinese, Vietnamese or Korean will be able to seek interpreter's assistance on the phone when filling out a survey form. Speakers of 50 other languages will have the option of ordering an instruction brochure in their native tongue.
The survey forms will be mailed out in March 2010. Households that do not send back filled questionnaires will be visited by a census employee who will try to gather the requested data. Participation in the decennial population count is voluntary.
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