Broward County cannot afford a 2020 census undercount

The Broward County Commission unanimously passed a resolution on May 8 opposing the last-minute addition of a citizenship question on the 2020 census. Sadly, it’s not likely to accomplish much. Despite numerous legal challenges and over vehement public objection, the Trump administration has announced it will include the question, and now, communities will have to mount a massive and expensive public education effort to ensure that local immigrants are not afraid to complete the census.

Completion of the decennial census is mandatory, and a citizenship question has not been included on it since 1950. The U.S. Justice Department says it is adding the question back in because it needs a better count of voting age citizens to enforce Voting Rights Act protections against racial discrimination. But all it will really do is discourage immigrants from being counted.

Why is this issue important to Broward County residents? According to the 2016 American Community Survey, an annual sampling survey which does include a citizenship question, 258,000 or 13 percent of Broward County’s residents are noncitizens, and that itself is likely an undercount.

It’s important because census data is used not only to determine local representation in the House of Representatives, but also to determine funding for state and federal legislative programs in local communities. It determines distribution of funds that are used to support Medicare, Medicaid, housing and other economic assistance, health and welfare programs that are a lifeline for those who desperately need one.

Census data determines where funds will be used to build new schools, roads, health care facilities, child-care centers and senior centers. The 2020 census data will form the basis of countless government and academic studies that will drive public policy decisions for the next decade.

It’s not just a symbolic issue. An undercount in 2020 could cost the county millions in federal funding over the next 10 years. Losing federal funding doesn’t mean the community need goes away. It just means local government must find other ways to fund the gap.

It’s also not just a local issue. Adding the citizenship question to the 2020 census could keep millions of immigrants across our great and diverse nation from filling out their survey, undercounting who is present in America, a nation founded on immigrants.

Even before the issue of the citizenship question arose, immigrants (both citizens and non-citizens), low-income families, non-English speaking residents, less educated residents and persons experiencing homelessness have historically been the most undercounted groups in a census in Broward County. And yet they are often the residents who need help the most, and precisely the ones who stand to lose the most if public health and other programs are underfunded due to a census undercount.

All aspects of the 2020 census have undergone intense scrutiny and analysis to help ensure the most accurate count possible. The hurriedly added citizenship question has not undergone such scrutiny and experts on both sides of the aisle agree its inclusion this late in the process could drastically reduce the likelihood of an accurate count.

Legal challenges to the citizenship question may or may not be successful. If the courts allow the question, our county will have no choice but to face the consequences of whatever results from this census for the next 10 years.

Broward County and America cannot afford an undercount in census 2020.