Census Funding in the Economic Recovery Package

The recently enacted economic recovery package includes an additional $1 billion in funding for the 2010 Census, which will enable the Census Bureau to run the census more effectively.

The money will be used to help the bureau hire temporary staff that will go door-to-door and help people fill out their census forms, fund promotional activities like ads targeted at hard-to-count populations, and fund the bureau’s Partnership Program.  The Partnership Program encourages local leaders and organizations in poor and minority areas to help educate people about the importance of filling out the census form.

An accurate count is extremely important to the civil rights community because a disproportionate number of minorities and low-income people have been historically missed in the census. Census data is used to determine voting representation and to distribute federal funds for key services like education.