Judge orders Census deadline pushed to Oct. 31
While the U.S. Census Bureau aimed to wrap up their population count by Monday, Oct. 5, a court order calls on the Bureau to continue operations through Oct. 31.
Census workers received a text message Oct. 2 saying the Oct. 5 target date of ending collections was “not operative.”
“As a result of court orders, the October 5, 2020 target date is not operative, and data collection operations will continue through October 31, 2020. Employees should continue to work diligently and enumerate as many people as possible. Contact your supervisor with any questions.”
The motion for stay and preliminary injunction involves plaintiffs, the National Urban League, League of Women Voters, Black Alliance for Just Immigration and several against defendants, Commerce Secretary Wilbur L. Ross, Jr. and other federal department heads.
The plaintiffs state that the amended Census operational timeline that was affected by COVID-19 led to risks for the accuracy and quality of this year’s count.
U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh out of a court in California ruled that Census defied an injunction order by implementing their deadlines and said operations must continue through the end of the month.
The Census Bureau said they are updating their websites and all external and internal guidance to ensure compliance with the orders.
To date, more than 99 percent of housing units have been accounted for in the Census. About 33 percent were counted by census takers and other field-collection operations and another 67 percent of housing-unit residents responded online, by phone or mail.
The national response rate was 99.1 percent. Texas’ response rate is 99.7 percent and the state jumped from No. 22 on Sept. 26 to No. 17 for response rate.
Wichita County was slightly higher than Texas for self-response rate at 64.5 percent versus the state’s 62.4 percent. The city of Wichita Falls self-response rate increased slightly over last week from 63.1 percent to 63.5 percent.
The planned Census deadline, ending field operations Sept. 30, would have allowed Ross to deliver the first set of results to President Donald Trump by Dec. 31.
In the second ruling, Judge Koh clarified that the Sept. 30 was to be suspended as the bureau made changes that “cured all legal defects” alledgely caused by the Census’ re-plan after COVID hit.
"Defendants' dissemination of erroneous information; lurching from one hasty, unexplained plan to the next; and unlawful sacrifices of completeness and accuracy of the 2020 Census are upending the status quo, violating the Injunction Order, and undermining the credibility of the Census Bureau and the 2020 Census," Koh wrote in the new order.
Claire Kowalick, a senior journalist for the Times Record News, covers local government, military and MSU Texas. If you have a news tip, contact Claire at ckowalick@gannett.com.
Twitter: @KowalickNews