Tribes lag in numbers responding to census
Undercount can hurt funding, representation
It’s a question Skye Alloway comes across a lot in her work with the 2020 census:
By the time she’s done talking, she said, the person is usually excited about filling out the census.
“I really try to make it relatable,” said Alloway, the Forest County Potawatomi tribal liaison for the U.S. Census.
When talking recently with a Potawatomi mother, who was expecting another child, she tied the census to what it could mean for health care for the woman’s children.
“I was able to let her know that this data is what hospitals look for, what they will be basing strategic plans and budgets on to know how many OBs to bring into the area,” Alloway said.
Wisconsin has the nation’s secondhighest response rate to the census behind Minnesota, with nearly seven in 10 households having submitted responses. But in most tribal areas in the state, response rates are lagging far behind, with as few as two in every 10 households responding, more than three months since the constitutionally-required, decennial count began.
U.S. Census officials point to disruption caused by the coronavirus pandemic as part of what’s driving the low response rates. Some census operations were put on hold as governments across the country put stay-at-home orders in place.
Risk of undercount
Native American people have long been at risk of being missed in the census.
Nationwide, an estimated 1 in 7 Native Americans living on reservations were missed by census takers in 2010, according to an audit of the 2010 census. Some of the missing people may have been accounted for in the final count, through a statistical process that assigns characteristics, such as age, sex and race, to people who did not respond to the census but whom census takers know or suspect exist.
According to the 2010 count, there are more than 86,000 people who identify as Native American in Wisconsin. Of those, more than 17,000 live on reservations or trust land of one of the state’s 11 federally recognized tribes.
Any undercount can have very real consequences for tribal communities.
The census is used to distribute political power. It is used to determine how many seats in the U.S. House each state gets and to draw boundaries for local, state and federal political districts.
It also helps drive funding decisions. Hundreds of federal programs, including Medicare, Medicaid, Head Start and the National School Lunch Program rely on data derived from the census to divvy up hundreds of billions of dollars every year.
Some studies have estimated that states lose hundreds — or thousands — of dollars each year for every uncounted person, according to demographer William O’Hare, who has studied the undercount of young children in the census.
Alloway said there is power in numbers. “Every individual is important,” she said. “They can make a tangible difference for their community for the next 10 years” by filling out the census.
Census workers have until Oct. 31 to complete the count, a deadline that was extended three months in response to the pandemic. In August, most Census offices will begin door-to-door follow-up visits to households that did not respond to the census on their own.
Households can submit responses to the census through Oct. 31 by mail, phone or online at my2020census.gov.
Menominee County, which comprises the Menominee reservation, has the lowest response rate of any county in Wisconsin, at about 19%, according to recently updated census data.
In most other tribal areas, the response rates range from 20% to 40%. On the Lac Courte Oreilles reservation, only about 24% of households have responded. On the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa reservation, it’s about 34%.
In Forest County, where the Potawatomi community is and where about 15% of the county population is Native American, only about three in 10 households have responded.
Census efforts delayed
The pandemic is partly to blame for the low number of responses to the census on tribal land. In mid-March, the Census Bureau stopped operations that would have hand-delivered census questionnaires to households in rural communities that may not receive mail delivery.
Three tribes in Wisconsin — the Menominee, the Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa and the Sokaogon Chippewa Community — had planned to deliver census materials that way, said Marilyn Miller, a Census Bureau tribal partnership specialist and member of the Lac du Flambeau tribe.
In early June, the census restarted those operations in the region.
Meanwhile, the Potawatomi, along with the Stockbridge-Munsee Community and the Red Cliff Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, had originally planned to undertake a special operation designed for remote areas, in which census takers visit households and conduct the census in person, Miller said.
Then the pandemic hit, and in order to minimize any risk to the community from COVID-19, the three tribes switched to mailing out census materials.
Even in tribal communities that had planned on mailing out census materials all along, response rates are still comparatively low, including in the tribal areas of the Bad River tribe, the Ho-Chunk Nation and the Lac Courte Oreilles tribe.
The Oneida Nation has the only tribal areas in Wisconsin showing a response rate over 40%. Nearly 80% of households in Oneida tribal areas have filled out the census, according to Census Bureau data.
Historically ‘hard-to-count’
Demographers say there are many reasons why people are missed in the census.
In his book, “Differential Undercounts in the U.S. Census: Who is Missed,” demographer O’Hare points to many possible explanations: People may be confused about who to include in their questionnaire. They may be suspicious of the government or not trust the Census Bureau to keep their information confidential. They may conceal household members for fear of reprisals. They may not be able to respond because of language barriers. They may not receive a questionnaire because they live at a non-traditional address or in a remote area.
“Historically, there’s been some skepticism about the federal government recording data about Indigenous peoples in their own homes and that’s largely based on tribes’ past experiences working with the federal government, a pattern of broken promises and actions that have led to distrust of the federal government,” said Mikhail Sundust, communications policy program coordinator at the American Indian Policy Institute in Arizona.
The Census Bureau is required to keep census responses confidential and may only use census information it collects for statistical purposes. Under federal law, it is illegal for the Census Bureau to release census responses that identify individuals until 72 years after the bureau collects it.
Alloway, of the Potawatomi tribe, says there is a lot of confusion about how to fill out the census, especially when a household is large or complex. She said in cases where a child may live in two different homes or where Indian Child Welfare is involved, it can be confusing how to count that child.
“I think that education and empowerment is the key to getting a complete and accurate census,” she said.
The Census Bureau hopes by teaming up with tribal members and leaders who are trusted and knowledgeable about their communities, they can help boost response rates.
“The most important thing is constant positive messaging, especially from tribal leaders,” Sundust said. “I see tribal leaders doing Instagram and Facebook videos talking about how important it is to be counted, and I think that’s something we need to encourage.”
The Ho-Chunk Nation offered free T-shirts that say “Ho-Chunk and I count” to the first 100 tribal members on April 1 to complete the census online.
The Potawatomi are trying to spread the message through their newspaper and through their community lunch program, Alloway said.
The Oneida Nation reached out to members months before the census was to begin, said Jennifer Webster, an Oneida Business Committee councilwoman. They promoted the census on social media platforms and during General Tribal Council meetings, semi-annual meetings attended by hundreds of members, she said.
The National Congress of American Indians points to other creative ways tribes have reached out to their members, including by hosting virtual community events and game nights and sharing census pamphlets and stickers in community food pickups. The council also recommends virtual canvassing, including through phone banking or Facebook Live, to remind people to fill out their census form.
Sarah Volpenhein is a Report for America corps reporter who focuses on news of value to underserved communities for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Please consider supporting journalism that informs our democracy with a tax-deductible gift to this reporting effort at JSOnline.com/RFA.