The Montana State-Tribal Relations Committee is learning more about plans for the 2020 Census.
A census representative at a Friday committee meeting in Helena said one of the biggest issues from the 2010 Census was a low response rate across all tribal lands in Montana.
They attributed that to a lack of alternative resources for tribal members to respond to the Census.
The Census rep said now Complete Count Committees have been formed on all tribal lands except for the Crow tribe.
“We have the ability to go into the 2010 Census documents and look at Montana at what counties and even census tracts are low-response rate. We’ve got one, one in the whole state. Guess where that is, Big Horn County. So, we are focused in the next couple of weeks of getting out there and getting that done,” says Colleen McCarthy, the U.S. Census bureau partnership specialist.
Officials estimate Montana will receive about $2,000 for each person counted, which is $20,000 per person for the decade.
You can now respond to the census with an online application. The application is expected to open on March 12, 2020.
