While the U.S. Census Bureau plans to collect census forms online, by phone or through the mail, inevitably not everyone will participate. During the 2010 census, about a quarter of all households in Arizona failed to send back their forms, according to Jason Jurjevich, an associate professor of practice at the University of Arizona School of Geography and Development. Jurjevich authored a report examining the state’s hard-to-count populations and looked at how many Arizonans could potentially fail to respond to the 2020 census without improved outreach. He discussed his findings with Lorraine Rivera and explained how an undercount could impact the entire state.
“It’s about money and power,” Jurjevich said. “An average Arizonan brings in roughly $3,000 in federal funding per person, per year to the state. That’s determined by census numbers.”
Read his entire report here.
