Census Bureau asks local groups for help in count

Not all colonias are easily found on a map.

Unlike well-known ones like Las Milpas, some are far off the beaten path without access even to mailboxes where U.S. census questionnaires can be delivered, said Merida Escobar, president of the South Texas Promotora Association.

But those colonias matter just as much as any other place in the decennial head count of every person in the country.

The challenge for outsiders is finding them all.

Much is at stake, with the census result being used to re-apportion the seats in the U.S. House and to divvy up federal funding.

The U.S. Census Bureau is partnering with promotoras — community health workers — and community groups to ensure an accurate count in South Texas. It’s one of several tactics the agency is using to avoid undercounting Hispanics, a population that is historically undercounted.

Escobar, whose South Texas Promotora Association comprises more than 200 community health workers, is already talking to the colonia residents she visits to inform them of what to expect from the census and assuage any fears.

“They’re here and they’re part of our community,” she said Friday at a conference in Edinburg for all census partners. “We need to make sure they’re counted.”

Colonia dwellers, migrant workers and undocumented immigrants generally lead to an undercount in areas where there is a large Hispanic population.

That phenomenon prompted the Census Bureau to take steps to improve its counting procedures in areas like South Texas, said Gabriel Sanchez, a regional director for the agency who oversees Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi.

A bilingual questionnaire will be mailed to 13 million households nationally to help improve response rates, he said. Census workers tasked with going to homes that don’t respond will largely be bilingual as well.

Despite being one of the fastest-growing regions in the country, the Rio Grande Valley’s response rates to census mailings in 2000 were among the worst in the state.

“There is an undercount (of Hispanics) and every missed person can mean missed dollars for the community,” Sanchez said, noting the government splits up $400 billion in funding based on the census count. “We try to make sure that we balance that out.”

Mary Lou Cavazos, a partnership specialist for the census, said the bureau has joined local groups to ease confidentiality concerns and ensure that residents, documented and undocumented alike, are counted.

The Census Bureau is asking its partners to counteract a call by the National Coalition of Latino Clergy and Christian Leaders to boycott the census until the federal government takes up immigration reform.

“Although they have good intentions (for their cause), the census supersedes that,” Cavazos said. “Everyone should be counted.”

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Jared Janes covers Hidalgo County government, Edinburg and general assignments for The Monitor. He can be reached at (956) 683-4424.