Amid immigration crackdown, Census grapples with how to boost Hispanic count in Wichita
With hundreds of millions of dollars at stake, Wichita and Sedgwick County are working to ensure everybody — especially the hard-to-count Hispanic population — gets tallied in the 2020 Census that begins in a couple of months.
“Really folks, this is all about dollars, this is all about money,” said Steve Hale, a partnership specialist with the Census Bureau. “Kansas receives from the federal government, with the population counts as the core, $6 billion a year.”
About 70 community leaders from government, media, churches and other private sector interests have joined a committee that met for the first time Friday to work toward getting a complete count and making sure the Wichita area gets its fair share of federal funds.
That may not be easy.
Wichita has the largest population of Hispanic residents in the state. But many of those residents live in the shadow of possible deportation or have family members who do.
“Most of the Latino people in Wichita, or in Kansas, we are part of mixed status families,” said Claudia Amaro, a member of the Complete Count Committee and onetime undocumented immigrant who now has legal status. “Some of them are green-card holders, some of them are DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals), some of them are even undocumented. So most of us Latinos have a member in our family who is or has been undocumented.”
President Trump has made finding and deporting unauthorized immigrants a high-level federal priority.
“It’s just a concern even if you do have documents, like if you are DACA or have a work permit or have the green card,” Amaro said. “With the political rhetoric it’s kind of hard and scary if you are not a U.S. citizen, so there’s a lot of things at risk.”
The Trump administration is fighting through the courts to include a question asking every U.S. resident’s citizenship status on the Census form.
The case is currently before the Supreme Court, which will rule on whether the administration has sufficient grounds to include the question, which hasn’t been asked as part of the Census since 1950.
Critics of the citizenship question say it’s designed to discourage Hispanic people from filing a Census form, which would in turn reduce their political influence and federal funding for their communities.
Their case was bolstered when a trove of computer files from a deceased Republican redistricting strategist indicated the citizenship question would give white and Republican candidates an advantage in future elections.
Hale addressed the Supreme Court case and concerns it raises at Friday’s committee meeting.
“Everybody’s going, ‘What about the citizenship question?’ It’s on there right now until the Supreme Court rules otherwise,” Hale said. “Probably by next Friday the Supreme Court will be ruling on whether or not that citizenship question is on there.”
He said however the court rules, “We are still going to pursue a complete and accurate count,” he said. “It might change some of our messaging, but it’s not going to change the importance of what we’re doing. So it’s just something we have to deal with.”
He said Census workers have to swear a lifetime oath that they won’t reveal individuals’ information from their forms and the penalty for that is severe, a minimum five years in prison and $250,000 fine.
“The data is protected,” he said. “Your records are kept confidential for 72 years, and I look out here and I don’t see anybody who’s gonna be around in 72 years.”
Most important to the immigrant population, the Census can only share aggregated data and is barred from sharing individuals’ information with any other government agency.
“It’s not shared with Homeland Security, it’s not shared with ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement), it’s not shared with Commerce,” he said.
Despite her community’s concerns, Amaro said she plans to promote Census compliance through her radio show “Planeta Venus” on KHLT-FM, a Spanish language radio station better known as La Raza 99.7.
About 95 percent of residents will be contacted by mail and asked to reply to the Census online, if possible. About five percent will have the form dropped off at their home.
Residents without internet access will be able to respond by phone or mail, Hale said.
Early canvassing will begin in August. Most residents will hear from the Census in March. April 1 is the official Census Day.
Following the 2010 Census, Garden City, which has a large immigrant population in the meat packing industry, sued the Census Bureau twice.
Garden City claimed its population was undercounted, diluting its influence at the state Capitol and denying the city its fair share of federal funding. It lost both times.
While immigrants can’t vote, every one of them counts toward an area’s representation in the state and federal government.
Kansas once had eight seats in Congress, but because of population changes recorded by the Census, that’s been cut in half.
The 1930 Census cut the Kansas delegation to seven members, 1940 dropped it to six, 1960 brought it down to five, and 1990 dropped it to the current four seats.
There has been some talk that Kansas could lose another seat because its population isn’t keeping up with the rest of the country. But Hale said it’s unlikely that will happen this round.
Mostly, 2020 is about qualifying for federal funds, he said.
In Kansas, the top five federal programs tied to the Census are Medicaid, student loans, supplemental nutrition — better known as SNAP or food stamps — Medicare and highway construction.
Other local programs affected by Census numbers include Section 8 housing voucher, Pell grants for students, special education funds, Head Start and business loans.
“This is a quality of life issue,” Hale said. “And it’s based on those numbers.”
At the state level, Gov. Laura Kelly is putting together a complete count committee to seek benefits for all Kansans.
It will be co-chaired by former Google Earth developer and executive Brian “Bam” McClendon, a Democrat who ran for secretary of state last year; and Joyce Warshaw, a Republican city commissioner from Dodge City.
This story was originally published June 21, 2019 at 7:41 PM.
