Census Impostors

Census officials reported Wednesday that impostors pretending to be census workers have attempted to gain entrance to the homes of three South Bay women this week.

In all three cases, the only residents home at the time were women. All three refused to allow the men inside and reported the incidents to the South Bay census office in San Pedro. The incidents occurred Monday and Tuesday nights.

Regional census officials said they have received no other reports of impostors visiting homes in Southern California.

In one case in Torrance, two men told a female resident sometime after 10 p.m. that they were census managers checking up on an enumerator who had been at the house earlier in the evening. The impostors were dressed in shirts and ties and were described as in their late 20s.

Another case occurred in Gardena and a third in either Carson or Wilmington, census officials said. They could not provide more detailed information and said they did not know if the same impostors were involved in all three incidents.

South Bay district director Carl Bailey warned residents to only speak to census workers displaying a red, white and blue census badge and carrying official census materials in a red, white and blue census tote bag. The official enumerators wear street clothes, but their visits are conducted before 9 p.m.

The follow-up visits, in which almost 90,000 South Bay homes are targeted, will be conducted through June.