[Durham INC] Durham's Census Outreach Efforts Pay Off

[Blalock, Amy]

CITY OF DURHAM

Office of Public Affairs

101 City Hall Plaza

Durham, NC 27701

 

 

News Release

 

For Details, Contact:

Amy Blalock

Sr. Public Affairs Specialist

(919) 560-4123 x 11253

(919) 475-7735 (cell)

Amy.Blalock at durhamnc.gov

 

For Immediate Release:  April 30, 2010

 

 

Durham's Census Outreach Efforts Pay Off

City-Led Outreach Efforts Significantly Increase 2010 Mail-In Response
Rates 

 

DURHAM, N.C. - The City of Durham's efforts to reach out to
lowest-response communities to encourage Census mail-in participation
has paid off with significant increases in almost all of the targeted
areas.

 

The effort, led by the City's Department of Neighborhood Improvement
Services, worked in conjunction with other City departments and partner
organizations to distribute Census materials and begin community
conversations about the bottom-line importance that an accurate Census
count means for Durham's future federal funding.  The outreach targeted
the 12 lowest-response communities during the 2000 Census, with the goal
of increasing the response rate by 2 percent.  

 

According to yesterday's report at the 2010 Complete Count Committee
meeting, the coordinated effort has far exceeded that goal in most of
those areas.  "In all but three areas, we had an increase in the
response rate.  In fact, in seven of those areas, the response rate
increased between 5 percent all the way up to 24 percent," said
Constance Stancil, director of the City's Department of Neighborhood
Improvement Services.  "This is incredible and these rates are only
going to go up when the Census enumerators hit the streets and start
going door-to-door.  I am very proud of the efforts of my department,
other City staff, and our community partner organizations.  These folks
put their boots on the ground and went door-to-door in many cases to
increase the mail-in response rate.  Their hard work is going to go a
long way in getting an accurate final count, which is going to determine
how much Durham will receive from the more than $400 billion dollars of
federal funding each year that is spent on infrastructure and services."

 

The response rates for the 12 targeted areas are as follows:

Lowest-Response 

Census Tract Areas

2000 Response Rate

2010 Response

Rate

Percentage Increase/Decrease

Wellons Village

57

58

+1%

Albright/North Durham

50

55

+5%

Downtown Central

44

68

+24%

Golden Belt

48

59

+11%

Hope VI/Hoover Road

53

58

+5%

McDougal Terrace/

Durham Technical Community College

48

54

+6%

Lincoln Health Center

54

62

+8%

Lakewood

49

45

-4%

Downtown/Southside

52

62

+10%

Duke University

37

20

-17%

Duke Hospital

55

54

-1%

Southwest Central Durham/

West End

54

55

+1%

 

According to Stancil, the response rate noted above is not accurate for
Duke University since the University is submitting the student count as
a block.  "The 20 percent number is not reflective of the actual number.
We anticipate that the count for the University will be close to 100
percent for on-campus students.  University staff is meeting to discuss
how to count off-campus students, so we believe that Duke's count will
be excellent," Stancil said.

 

The Complete Count Committee is not done with its efforts to increase
response rates and will continue to reach out to the low-response
communities in the coming weeks.  "We still have many people in this
community, particularly in our low-response tracts, which have not
completed the Census," Stancil said.  "Our goal is to continue to help
reach out to these communities to get them to open their doors to the
enumerators and to assure them that the Census is safe and
confidential."

 

For more information on the 2010 Census, including the location of
Questionnaire Assistance Centers and Be Counted sites that are now open
throughout the city, visit www.2010Census.gov or contact the local
Durham Census Office at (919) 328-1310.  To learn more about Durham's
Census 2010 Complete Count Committee, visit the City's Web site at 
www.durhamnc.gov/departments/planning/complete_count_comm.cfm. 

 

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