News Details

Census Bureau to start visiting homes on May 1

April 30, 2010

Last week, the Census Bureau ended the mail-response portion of the 2010 Census. The nation reached its 2000 Census mark with 72 percent. Solano County's participation rate was 71 percent, up from the 67 percent in the 2000 census.

The Census Bureau now will launch its Non-Response Follow-Up operation next week, where census takers will conduct in-person visits to households that did not return their census forms.

Households that did not return their forms - or did not receive a form for a plethora of reasons - will be counted. Census takers will begin the in-person visits May 1. 

In most cases, census workers will make initial visits during afternoons, early evenings and weekends – when most people are likely to be home.

Census takers may visit you if:

  • You did not mail back the completed form sent to your mailbox.
  • You submitted an incomplete form.
  • You submitted your form too late to be pulled from our list of non-responding households. The Census Bureau asks that residents be patient with the census taker and provide them your information to ensure that everyone is counted.
  • Census Bureau couldn't match/confirm the address you provided on a "Be Counted" form or what you provided over the phone.
  • Census Bureau sent a form to your physical address, but the post office returned it to us as undeliverable. This includes households that may normally receive their mail at a PO Box, instead of a physical address.
Nationwide, about 635,000 local residents have been hired as census takers to complete this important task in their neighborhoods.

All takers – like all Census Bureau employees – take an oath of confidentiality, where they’re sworn to safeguard and protect the information they collect. This is a lifetime oath. Penalty for violating the oath is a $250,000 fine and/or 5 years in prison.

Information collected by census takers is not shared with any other government agency, law enforcement agency, tribal housing authority or your landlord.

The Census Bureau asks residents to cooperate with census takers when they arrive at your doorstep.
  • It takes less than 10 minutes to complete, if you cooperate with census takers.
  • Census takers are hired within your community – and often times at the census block level. So the census taker at your door most likely is the daughter, son or grandparent of your neighbor.
  • The information collected determines congressional apportionment and how more than $400 billion in federal funding is distributed.
  • Counting every person living in the United States is constitutionally mandated.
  • Census takers have no need to come into your home, since it will only take a few minutes.
Census takers will have Census ID that bears the Department of Commerce Watermark and a shoulder bag with a Census Bureau logo printed on the side.

Census takers will never ask for your social security number, bank account number, credit card information or PIN numbers. The questions asked only will pertain to the 2010 Census questionnaire: name, gender, age, date of birth, ethnic origin, race and whether the respondent owns or rents.

If a resident doubts the validity of a census taker, they are urged to ask for the census worker’s supervisor’s phone number and/or the Local Census Office number for residents to call and verify that the person is a bona fide census taker.

Census takers will visit up to three times in person and, if there is a phone number available, residents will be called up to three times to complete the questionnaire for a household.

Census takers will ask who lived at the house on April 1, 2010, which is our reference date for the 2010 Census.

Households that have not been visited by a census taker and did not mail back a completed 2010 Census questionnaire may contact the toll-free TQA number, where they can provide the answers to the 10-question form over the phone. 

While the Census Bureau can’t guarantee that calling the number will prevent a census taker from visiting their household, this is one way for folks to ensure that they are counted.

Also, the TQA is an ideal way for folks who don't live in traditional housing - homeless, living at the place where they work, etc - to be counted if they believe that they haven't already.

The TQAs will remain open until July 30. The phone number is: 1-866-872-6868.

Posted: April 30, 2010