KC group says data misrepresents Latino Kansans. A new project could change that
A community organization based in Wyandotte and Johnson counties wants to collect new data about Kansas’ Latino community. More specifically, the group is aiming to learn more about the educational, health, housing and labor outcomes among Latino Kansans.
Why? To offer a clearer image on what life in Kansas really looks like for people with Latin backgrounds — who haven’t always been reflected accurately in demographic research — to help inform future policies, programs and decisions.
El Centro Inc., a local organization that offers support, like housing opportunities and access to education, to Latinos and others living in the Kansas City metro, is launching a year-long community assessment to do just that.
“This long-overdue project will focus on creating a comprehensive, community-led portrait of the Latino experience in Kansas — through data, stories and lived realities,” according to an October news release. “It is the right time, and this is the right project.”
The organization at the close of Hispanic Heritage Month, which runs Sept. 15-Oct. 15, announced it would be searching for a project coordinator and research group to lead the initiative. As of this week, a few people have responded to El Centro’s requests for proposals.
El Centro said it plans to review those proposals and choose someone to spearhead the project sometime in mid-December, meaning contracts would be in place to start in January.
The organization also plans to invite Latino leadership figures and groups across Kansas to join El Centro’s project advisory committee, Justin Gust, an El Centro spokesperson told The Star.
It will send those invitations next month, meaning an advisory committee and project team should be in place by the project’s target start date.
Given Latinidad, when someone is of Latin American heritage, is classified as an ethnicity instead of a race, people who are Latino that participate in demographic surveys and are required to mark their race can sometimes be unsure what to mark themselves down as, according to El Centro.
This, and fear of being included in data collection, can contribute to an underrepresentation of Latin Americans in demographic data.
“For too long, Latinos in Kansas have been underrepresented — or misrepresented — in data,” President and CEO Erica Andrade said in an October news release. “Early in my career writing grants, I struggled to find relevant data on Latinos in the Midwest let alone Kansas. And when data was available, it didn’t always reflect the realities of the families we serve.”
The year-long community survey will attempt to produce representative data for all Latino Kansans, regardless of documentation status, country of origin or language.
