Letter to the Editor:
Census data important to city, state
Published March 19, 2010
How old were you, and where did you live in the year 2000? I was 12, in junior high, and lived for the first part of that year in a Y2K bunker with my family, a generator, two shotguns and dozens of cases of canned food.
When my family finally emerged from the bunker in mid-March, we received a letter in the mail from the US Census Bureau. Relieved that society was still functioning normally after the Y2K scare, we completed the Census form, saying that we were a family of four who lives in a house we own. It was very simple, and we mailed it back the next day.
I relate that story to contrast it to my situation today. I live in a house in Columbia, my freshman brother lives in the off-campus apartment-dorms and my parents still live where they did in 2000. Earlier this week, we all received a Census form in our respective mail boxes, answered the ten questions for our current living situations, made sure our roommates did, too, and sent them back.
Hopefully, you received the Census form this week at your dorm, Greek house or apartment, filled it out and mailed it back, too. I know some of you didn't, though, because I have been trying to get students to vote on this campus for four years now, and your record is not great. If you need many reminders to register and vote, I thought you might need this letter to remind you to fill out the Census as well.
It is vitally important you do, for several reasons. First, Columbia will miss out on as much as $51 million in federal funds, according to The Missourian, if the 36,000 students in this town don't fill out the form. Second, Missouri is on the bubble to lose a congressional district if we come out about 10,000 people behind Minnesota. And third, Census "enumerators" will not be allowed to come into the dorms to gather missing information that you forgot to send back.
"But Nate," you say, "the Census form tells us to fill out the information for where we will be living on April 1, the week of Spring Break, and I will be back home/skiing in the Rockies/throwing back tequila shots in Cabo on that date!"
I know, but that's not where you normally live now. The form also says college students should be counted where they go to college, just as prisoners are counted where they are incarcerated (what's the difference, right?).
Now please go fill out the form if you forgot to. I don't want to be spending the first part of 2020 in a Y2K-like bunker because you forgot to fill out the form, thus leading to the downfall of our representative democracy.
