Thinking you’ll skip the 2020 census? Here’s how that could hurt the Kansas City area

Before Missourians filed their 2010 U.S. Census forms, the state’s delegation to the U.S. House of Representatives numbered nine. Now it’s eight.

Some believe Missouri lost a seat in Congress because tens of thousands of residents weren’t counted in 2010. They forgot to file, refused or couldn’t be tracked down.

The 2020 Census could be even more problematic due to a potential question about citizenship.

The Census Bureau expects as many as 630,000 U.S. households will either return the survey without answering that question, or won’t file at all — partly for fear that undocumented persons would be rounded up.

“These are totally valid fears,” said Brenda Sharpe, chief executive of the REACH Healthcare Foundation of Merriam.

But she and others across the region are urging everyone to return the forms next year, as those who don’t will deprive the metro of federal funds, private investment, perhaps some political representation and vital demographic information.

Just in terms of federal money, at stake in Kansas is $4.5 billion; more than $11 billion in Missouri, according to The George Washington University of Public Policy.

The money is awarded based on population size as well as demographics. Age and income patterns indicate an area’s need for federal help. All told, a Brookings Institute report found about 90 percent of funds distributed to cities and states are calculated using census data.

Even if the under-count for 2020 replicated that of 2010, the Census Bureau predicts big blows on federal funding for the Kansas City area.

It means potentially $20.5 million lost in Jackson County, $10.6 million lost in Johnson County, and upward of $5 million in each of Clay, Cass, Platte and Wyandotte counties.

That’s money for, among myriad services, Head Start (which draws $63 million in federal funds across Kansas), highway maintenance ($897 million to Missouri), housing projects and special education grants.

Assistant Wyandotte County administrator Gordon Criswell, who co-chairs a Unified Government committee encouraging community groups to get out the word for the highest possible census participation, said the ramifications of an under-count could be devastating.

“That’s a level of federal funding we’d be losing for 10 years.”

The county is home to an estimated 11,000 undocumented immigrants.

Skipping questions could mean a visit

In the 2010 Census, experts estimate that 1 percent of the U.S. population was not counted.

But consider the many changes since in public behavior: our greater mobility, more extended households, a 24/7 work culture, wide distrust of government and the political chasm over illegal immigration.

All might combine to work against an accurate 2020 count.

“It’s the census that gives you data for each individual block,” said Steve Lebofsky of Kansas City Hall’s Census Data and Forecasting Office. “If one person doesn’t (file) it’s no big deal. If everybody doesn’t, those areas are going to be hurt.”

The foreign-born population in the Kansas City region exceeds 135,000 — 7 percent of the total population and more than a three-fold increase since 1990, according to a 2016 report of the Migration Policy Institute. Most live in Johnson and Jackson counties; 12 percent reside north of the Missouri River.

Seventy percent are naturalized U.S. citizens, lawful permanent residents or otherwise legal. The Washington-based institute estimates about 30 percent of the region’s foreign-born residents are undocumented.

That the Census Bureau will urge people to file online in 2020 adds to concerns of a looming under-count.

It makes sense: Who does snail mail anymore?

But among people spooked about the feds sharing data about non-citizens and undocumented workers, how secure is the internet?

Sharpe of the nonprofit REACH Healthcare, which serves the poor, said anyone worried about answering a citizenship question online ought to return the paper form.

“If they complete the paper form, nobody’s going to knock on your door” for not filing, she said.

Census officials say even one skipped question increases the chances of a survey-taker reaching out to complete the form. But the bureau stresses that those hired to knock on doors do not share your information with law enforcement.

And while participation in the census is “mandatory” and codified in the U.S. Constitution, people rarely get busted for not returning the survey.

But penalties are possible, according to the United States Code, Title 13, Chapter 7. If you’re over 18 and refuse to answer all or part of the census, you can be fined up to $100. If you give false answers, you’re subject to a fine of up to $500.

If you offer suggestions or information with the “intent to cause inaccurate enumeration of population,” you are subject to a fine of up to $1,000, up to a year in prison, or both.

[Source: U.S. Census Bureau]

Up to Supreme Court

The 2020 citizenship question — the first to be posed in the census in decades — will come before the U.S. Supreme Court before June. Much needs to decided beyond the Constitutional grounds: Would answering be mandatory or optional? If that part of the census is not filled out, would respondents be counted in the population?

And could U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement use the data to target illegal residents?

“ICE has accessed these lists in the past” to make sweeps, said local immigration lawyer Jessica Piedra. “And even if (the census) is not actually used, that’s the news and rumors going through these communities.”

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, whose department oversees the Census Bureau, has said the U.S. Justice Department initiated the request for the question to better monitor and enforce aspects of the Voting Rights Act. Non-citizens are prohibited from voting.

The Supreme Court’s review comes in the face of at least seven lawsuits filed over President Trump’s administration’s decision to include the question, which asks for each household member, “Is this person a citizen of the United States?”

Justice spokeswoman Kelly Laco said in a statement said that the department looks forward to making its case before the high court “defending the government’s legal and reasonable decision to reinstate a citizenship question on the 2020 census.”