Beginning tomorrow – Thursday, March 12 – Wake Forest area homeowners should be on the lookout for a post card from the 2020 Census providing information to fill out the census data for that household online.
Yes. In the midst of an extremely troubling novel coronavirus epidemic sweeping across the country, at a time when we are thinking about avoiding unnecessary public contact, the 2020 Census has fortuitously provided an in-home online method of complying with the census information.
You do have to wait for the post card, which should arrive by March 20, because it will include an identification number and instructions about whether that household can provide the information online or by telephone or mail. You can choose from those three methods of answering, and the directions are in the post card.
Census officials say it should only take about 10 minutes to fill out the forms which ask who is living in your household on that date. You will be asked for your name and telephone number, how many people live in the house and if it is owned or rented. You will also have to provide the name, sex, date of birth, ethnicity and race of each person and how they are related. If you leave a blank accidentally or on purpose, you can expect to have a census employee knocking on your door very soon.
The survey you have to fill out is available in English, Spanish, Chinese, Vietnamese, Korean, Russian, Arabic, Tagalog, Polish, French, Haitian Creole, Portuguese and Japanese. There are also language guides, both video and print, for 59 other languages as well as American Sign Language, braille and large print. If you are blind or have poor vision, you can print a guide to the survey in braille or large print from 2020CENSUS.GOV.
It is legal to ask about race and ethnicity in the census. Since 1970 the census has asked people of Hispanic origin which broad Hispanic group they identify with, and the census has collected racial data since 1790. The 2020 Census has 15 racial categories and a write-in option.
It is vital that everyone in North Carolina be counted as well as in every other state and territory because the head count in each state determines how many congressmen and congresswomen go to the House of Representatives. It also determines how much money the federal government provides for education, school lunch programs, Head State programs, Women, Infants and Children (WIC), the state Children’s Health Insurance program, food stamps (SNAP), Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), transportation from highways to trails and Community Development Block Grants.
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