Up for the Count

Kicking off what promises to be the largest survey ever of the local population, the U.S. Census Bureau officially opened its Ventura County office Friday with a pledge to perform the most accurate count to date during the once-a-decade event.

Dozens of elected officials, school district representatives and community leaders gathered at the Market Street office in Ventura, where as many as 700 census takers will be stationed this spring when the head count swings into high gear.

Vincent Galvez, manager of the local census office, called on those in attendance to help drive home the importance of the 2000 census to local communities.

“It is our right and responsibility to participate in the census,” said Galvez, a retired Navy manager tapped in August to head the local effort. “If we don’t fill out our census forms, we won’t receive our fair share from the government.”

Although the local office has been in business since July, Census Bureau officials used Friday’s event to remind residents the tally is coming and to launch a recruitment campaign for the small army of workers needed to get the numbers right.

The Ventura office was one of 39 offices opened Friday in 24 counties in California and Hawaii in preparation for the event. And it is one of 520 offices set up nationwide to perform the enumeration, the largest peacetime endeavor ever undertaken by the federal government, officials say.

Information generated by the census is used to determine federal, state and local legislative districts. The numbers also help determine how much federal money is spent in communities on everything from public schools to road construction.

Undercounts are believed to have cost California one congressional seat over the past decade, along with millions of dollars in federal money for such services as health care, education and housing assistance.

Rep. Elton Gallegly (R-Simi Valley), the highest-ranking official on hand for the grand opening, said the Census Bureau has estimated that California stands to pick up at least one more congressional seat if an accurate count can be achieved.

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“The census serves to provide the clout that we need,” Gallegly said. “Our priorities will be heard better if we have a larger majority in Congress, trust me.”

Letters describing the census process will be sent in early March to residents nationwide, at which time recipients may ask for questionnaires in Spanish, Chinese, Vietnamese, Korean and Tagalog.

Those questionnaires should arrive in the second half of March and take about 15 minutes to fill out. The deadline to return the questionnaires is April 1.

Anyone who doesn’t do so can expect a knock on the door from a Census Bureau worker, one of 20,000 who will be hired to go door-to-door in the Southern California-Hawaii region alone.

“We wanted to let people know the census is coming, to prepare for it and to ask as many people as possible to please apply for jobs,” said John Reeder, the Census Bureau’s regional director. “And it’s working. Our phones are ringing off the hook.”

The intensive effort is well worth it, officials said.

Each uncounted person costs the typical city $150 to $190 a year in lost revenue. That means a city stands to lose at least $1.5 million a year if just 10,000 people go uncounted.

Understanding that bottom-line reality, Oxnard 10 years ago created a task force to help ferret out those traditionally overlooked during the census--such as children, minorities and the homeless.

Task force members went door-to-door to find people who had not taken part in the count. As a result, the city submitted a list of 12,000 people overlooked by census takers. Oxnard spent $230,000 on that effort, and officials estimate the city has received an additional $4 million in state and federal revenue over the past decade.

This time around, the city has contracted with a nonprofit group--El Concilio del Condado de Ventura--to perform a similar outreach effort.

And Oxnard Mayor Manuel Lopez challenged other city officials Friday to follow suit.

“It is all about money,” Lopez told those in attendance. “If we do a good job here, we can get a proportional share back from the government to fill our needs.”

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Moorpark Mayor Pat Hunter said his city is ready to rise to the challenge.

Ventura County’s newest city, which will participate in its second census, has assigned a city staff member to work closely with the Census Bureau to help identify and update the community’s 9,000 residential addresses.

Hunter agrees the nationwide head count helps generate money for communities, a key factor for a city such as Moorpark, identified during the 1990 census as Ventura County’s richest and fastest-growing city.

The mayor said he is especially hopeful that retailers will see the strong numbers in Moorpark and decide to set up local businesses, boosting the city’s foundering sales-tax base.

“The numbers are so vital for so many reasons,” Hunter said. “I think we need to try to put it in dollars and cents to show people how important it is to participate in the census.”

FYI

The U.S. Census Bureau is hiring hundreds of workers in Ventura County to help ensure the most accurate population count possible. Pay for field staff positions ranges from $8.25 to $18.50 an hour. For more information on those jobs, call the bureau at 805-650-2150 or 800-325-7733.