Arizona is lagging the nation in census counting— billions of dollars are on the line
By Andrew Oxford for the Arizona Republic. Some things that define Arizona can be measured, like the depth of Grand Canyon and the miles between gas stations on empty desert roads.
Measuring the state’s population, though, is a lot harder.
Arizona is lagging behind the rest of the country in responding to the census, as efforts to tally residents in some of the hardest to reach corners of the state have only recently resumed after a hiatus due to public health concerns.
About 58% of Arizona households had responded to the census as of July 2, compared to nearly 62% of the country, and that rate is even higher in some areas, reaching 71% in Minnesota.
Arizona's rate of response to the census this year is not too far behind its rate in 2010, but the share of people who have participated in some of the areas that are often tougher to count remains low. The response rate in Apache County was only about 11% as of this week, for example — one of the lowest rates in the country.
The pandemic has upended the timeline for the massive decennial effort to count everyone living in the United States and there is a lot on the line.
“Now, more than ever, we’re seeing the importance of the census. CARES Act funding was directly tied to census numbers,” said Alec Esteban Thomson, executive director for the Arizona Complete Counts Committee, pointing to the $2 trillion relief package passed by Congress to extend a financial lifeline to many communities amid the coronavirus pandemic.
The census will determine how many representatives Arizona gets in Congress and the boundaries of every legislative district, determining much about the future political direction of the state and the nation. The survey will also determine how much federal funding Arizona receives for a range of programs and where that money is spent. Businesses and academic researchers rely on the data in their work, too.
The state stands to lose $887 in federal funding for every Arizonan who does not respond to the census, according to the state’s complete count committee.
That money pays for everything from buses to highways, Head Start programs and special education, housing and wildfire prevention.
Those who have yet to fill out the census can get more information at https://azcensus2020.gov/.
Federal funding to Arizona relies on census count
In fiscal year 2016, for example, Arizona received about $20 billion through 55 federal programs guided by census data, according to the George Washington University Institute of Public Policy.
That included:
$8.5 billion for Medicaid;
$1.4 billion for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program;
$731 million for highway planning and construction;
$278 million for the National School Lunch Program;
$203 million in special education grants;
$46 million for crime victim assistance.
Arizona is one of the harder states to count, however, with rural residents spread out across a rugged landscape, and a sprawling metropolitan region at the heart of it all that is home to millions of people who speak well over 100 languages.
The Urban Institute estimated last year that as many as 102,000 Arizonans are at high risk of not being counted and that risk is particularly high among Black, Latino and Indigenous residents. In turn, these communities may be underrepresented politically and in decision making about government policies.
The state has created a complete count committee to promote the census, and Gov. Doug Ducey signed an executive order July 1 extending its work through October, though recent budgets have not provided any specific funding for it.
The Census Bureau resumed outreach efforts last month in much of the country after suspending such operations in mid-March to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.
But field outreach only recently resumed in some areas that were particularly hard hit, such as the Navajo Nation. The response rate is only about 4% across the Navajo Nation, about 6% at the Gila River Indian Community and around 14% across the Tohono O'odham Nation.
While the response rate in Maricopa, Pima and Cochise counties have nearly reached 2010 levels, it is not close in many counties.
Next door to Apache County, in Navajo County the response rate is only around 26%.
Census operations at the Window Rock field office remained suspended until June 11.
The census has already mailed postcards to Arizonans encouraging them to complete the survey online or by phone.
At this point, the census is resuming a process interrupted in March known as “update leave.” Census workers head out to areas where residents may not receive mail at their homes, such as rural areas without door-to-door mail service, and deliver papers encouraging residents to complete the census.
This is expected to reach about 6.8 million households across the country, including more than a quarter of a million households in Arizona, according to the Census Bureau.
“In Arizona, the statewide response rate is almost 57% and is just a few percentage points shy of its final 2010 self-response rate. That’s good overall,” said Steven Romalewski, director of the City University of New York Mapping Service, which is tracking the census across the country. “But in the [update leave] areas, the response rates are very low.”
Thomson said the state is also launching a second advertising campaign that will focus particularly on rural, Spanish-speaking and tribal communities.
This comes as the federal government has expanded the timeframe for people to respond to the census on their own online or over the phone.
"We have this unprecedented situation where instead of having to self-respond by the end of April, people can self-respond through the end of October," said Romalewski. "It has also created this opportunity to have additional chances of getting the word out."
Census workers will head out in August to count Arizonans who have not responded to the census by that point, a process initially planned for May.
Contact Andrew Oxford at andrew.oxford@arizonarepublic.com or on Twitter at @andrewboxford.