LYNN — Every person counts in the upcoming federal census and two dozen social service, immigrant aid and faith organization representatives stand ready to help conduct an accurate city count.
“It’s important. People are so underrepresented in the city of Lynn,” said Centerboard Family Forward Resource Center Program Director Rebecca Laaser.
Mandated under the U.S. Constitution, the census seeks to count every person in the nation every 10 years. Massachusetts Secretary of State census specialist Uri Molina said the census directly determines community, state and congressional elected representation and federal dollar allocations.
The U.S. Census estimates every person not counted equals $2,500 in lost federal aid at the municipal and state level. “An undercount of the population can have negative, compounding effects on funding in Lynn,” stated the census presentation shown to Laaser and other organization representatives at the Lynn YMCA Wednesday.
The counting begins next month and runs into May. Households receive a census letter between March 12 and 20 labeled with an identification number specific to the resident’s address. Residents can “self respond” to the census online or by telephone.
The census does not ask questions about immigration or citizenship and census officials estimate the questions take about 10 minutes to answer.
Reminder letters and postcards will be mailed in March and April. Residents who have not filled out census forms by mid May will be visited by census takers. Census officials have acknowledged the challenge they face counting Lynn residents with 85 percent of local residents living in what census-affiliated organization MassCounts calls “hard-to-count census tracts.”
Laaser said Centerboard, a Lynn organization providing a broad range of services, is aware of the challenge and its employees are working to educate clients about the census’ importance.
“We want to be a safe place where people can come,” she said.
The Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition (MIRA) with strong ties to Lynn is involved in the state-wide “complete count” campaign aimed at educating people, including refugees and immigrants, about the census’ importance.
Along with Molina, MIRA representative Shiliu Wang stressed the census’ role in counting people at the location where they live and sleep. The 10 census questions include the resident’s name, relationship to person filling out the census, birth date, age, gender, race, ethnicity and “is person of Hispanic, Latino or Spanish origin?”
“That’s fewer questions that Facebook and Instagram would ask,” Wang said.
