City Counts on Volunteers to Help Tally Immigrants

With the biggest minority population in Orange County, this city has the most to lose--both in tax dollars and political punch--if the 1990 census fails to accurately tally immigrants, homeless people and other segments of America’s hidden population.

But Santa Ana civic leaders have deployed a battalion of civilian volunteers to eliminate the possibility of an undercount.

Already its efforts have earned praise from U.S. Census Bureau officials, who have named Santa Ana one of four “model cities” in America for the promotional campaign.

Indeed, city officials don’t appear to be taking chances. They believe that the city’s immigrant population was grossly undercounted in 1980, and they want to make sure 1990 is not a rerun.

Santa Ana launched its census campaign more than a year ago by forming a special “complete count” committee, which is charged with preparing people for the census before the national questionnaires are mailed in late March.

It has also introduced an eclectic slate of strategies aimed at eliminating the fears of immigrants and nudging them forward to take part in the count.

Organizers have produced their own slogan, “Census ’90 in Santa Ana, You Count,” and have recruited everyone from ice cream vendors to schoolchildren to spread the word.

City outreach workers have fanned out to local merchants and vendors, plastering flyers in their stores or on pushcarts. Supermarkets have been asked to stuff census flyers in grocery bags. The city has hired a college acting troupe to perform a census-based play that provides answers to likely questions about the nationwide survey.

Santa Ana will also produce a Spanish-language census video that will be shown on a local channel.

Even the city’s Girl Scouts and paperboys have been tapped.

The girls can earn special patches by learning about the census and sharing their knowledge with their families. Paperboys for Santa Ana’s Spanish weekly newspaper, Miniondas, are charged with finding potential neighborhood block captains who can relay information and ease fears about the census forms.

“We want to bring the census down to earth for residents,” Councilman Miguel A. Pulido said. “If the block captains are neighborhood people instead of a government man, they are going to be less afraid to ask questions and fill out the forms.”

For a year, outreach workers have given presentations at least once a night in English-language classes for immigrants attending Rancho Santiago College. The city has also worked closely with U.S. Census Bureau officials to outline the overcrowded sections of Santa Ana considered ripe for an undercount.

Much of the work so far has simply been preparation for the war against the undercount. The city’s census campaign will not swing into full action until later this month, when workers begin stuffing water bills with flyers promoting the census.

The Santa Ana Unified School district will join the effort, launching a special educational effort on the census for fourth-, fifth- and sixth-graders.

Aside from learning about the benefits of the national survey, the students will have to complete homework assignments that involve helping their parents fill out the questionnaires.