As the Census halts field operations due to the coronavirus, Lehigh Valley organizers must pivot strategy
By Kayla Dwyer
On March 12, the U.S. Census Bureau put millions of invitations in the mail for households to respond to the decennial population count. That same day, the Lehigh Valley confirmed its first case of the coronavirus.
Since then, schools closed, sports leagues suspended seasons, nonessential businesses in Pennsylvania shuttered. And last week, the Census Bureau announced all in-person field operations are suspended through at least April 1.
"Of all of our worst nightmares, of things that could go wrong with the census, we did not anticipate this set of actions," Albert Fontenot, associate director for decennial programs, said on a Friday news conference call.
In the Lehigh Valley and everywhere, officials are rethinking their outreach strategy to make sure everyone gets counted for the once-a-decade census whose deadline, as mandated by Congress, is still Dec. 31.
Other deadlines have been pushed back in light of the coronavirus, officials said Friday. Though 600,000 people accepted jobs as temporary census workers, their onboarding process is halted for two weeks until April 1. That means a two-week delay in the start of the nonresponse follow-up operations (from May 13 to May 28) and the deadline to complete that data collection (from July 31 to Aug. 14).
These 600,000 workers make up almost all of the jobs needed for the 2020 census, said Timothy Olson, associate director for field operations. But the bureau still wants people to apply, acknowledging that it will likely need to hire more people than planned as some drop out due to concerns over the coronavirus.
"There could be a greater loss of individuals out of fear," he said. "We will be overhiring when we resume to accommodate for a greater expected attrition."
The constitutionally mandated census and the coronavirus collide in more ways than logistically. Much of the Valley's most undercounted population — the elderly, the poor — are also at the highest risk for severe ramifications of COVID-19.
Lehigh Valley census committees and nonprofits had a coordinated strategy to reach those undercounted populations that involved canvassing work; visits to age-restricted housing, colleges and schools; census "hubs" set up at city nonprofits; and more, financed by $65,000 in grants funneled through the Lehigh Valley Community Foundation.
Kevin Greene, chief operating officer at Faces International, an Allentown marketing agency that is directing the digital aspects of the regional campaign, said about 70% of the strategy consisted of in-person community engagement and census hubs.
"We had a nice really robust strategy that was very effective, and then this hit," he said.
The foundation, in conjunction with the Lehigh and Northampton County Complete Count committees, last week received a $25,000 grant from the state for census outreach. Now they have to modify their proposal.
Faces International will transition completely to a digital strategy, moving beyond social media advertising and onto platforms such as YouTube. The adjusted message will ask residents to reach out to people they know who may not have internet. Officials have been steering people to fill out the questionnaire online.
"That's our best avenue that we have," Greene said. "It really is going to be the community coming together."
The community foundation will put more money toward bilingual radio, television and bus advertisements, communications director Michael Wilson said. Last week, the foundation sent out letters to grantees — nonprofits such as Casa Guadeloupe in Allentown and the Hispanic Center in Bethlehem — providing advice on how to change their strategies.
But it was also a message of understanding, as the agencies deal with their own ramifications of serving people amid the coronavirus.
"We were really concerned with the nonprofit sector and the impact on their capacity to deliver their services, let alone do these over-and-above activities like helping to promote the census," he said.
So regional partners are thinking about strategies to take some of the load, like phone banking and texting campaigns.
The only saving grace is that the census can be done online this year, Wilson said.
Olson said census workers are making contact with 335,000 partner organizations around the country to help them recraft their campaigns and communicate critical information, such as the fact that college students, even though most have been sent away from campus, are still to be counted in their college town.
Going forward, all temporary workers will be trained virtually, Olson said. As of Friday morning, 2.8 million people applied for temporary census jobs, and 18.6 million households have responded to the questionnaire.
Pennsylvania is slightly ahead of the national curve in terms of self-response to the census, according to numbers released over the weekend. So far, 20.4% of Pennsylvanians responded online, by mail or by phone, compared with 19.2% nationally. In Lehigh County, 20.8% responded, and in Northampton, 21.1%, according to the Census Bureau.
Morning Call reporter Kayla Dwyer can be reached at 610-820-6554 or at kdwyer@mcall.com.