McAllen Police Chief Victor Rodriguez is chairing the McAllen Complete Count Committee. (Photo: RGG/Steve Taylor)

McALLEN, Jan. 25 - The business community in the Rio Grande Valley should get behind efforts to promote a complete census count in the region, says Keith Patridge, president of the McAllen Economic Development Corporation.

Patridge is a member of the City of McAllen’s Complete Count Committee and the subcommittee that is working on outreach to the business community.

“We are asking local businesses to support and encourage their employees and associates to participate and answer the census questions,” Patridge told the Guardian.

Census Day is April 1, 2010. The U.S. Census Bureau will send out its census forms to every household in the nation in mid-March. There are ten questions on the forms and all information provided will be safeguarded. By law, the information cannot be shared with Border Patrol or ICE. The more Valley residents that are counted, Patridge said, the more federal and state dollars will flow to the region.

“The census will impact the amount of tax revenues that comes into the community. If we do not count all the people in our area, we are just cheating ourselves and our opportunity for growth and revenue from the federal government,” Patridge said.

Patridge said the census is important to the business community and economic development leaders because companies often make location and relocation decisions based upon census data. “Companies use the census data in determining location, for retail stores, for manufacturing plants, for any type of expansion or even where to grow existing plants,” he said.

Asked what the McAllen EDC was doing to promote the census, Patridge said: “We are just beginning to inform people about when it is coming, what the form will look like, the importance of it. We are putting posters into companies and plants. We are encouraging them to get their employees to participate and emphasising the importance of it.”

Patridge said the McAllen Complete Count Committee has identified some areas in the city where the census was not a high priority for residents in 2000. He cited parts of central and southwest McAllen.

“There are pockets that we have identified from the last census where we had a low response. Areas where there may be a lot of new arrivals and where people do not buy the paper, where there may be a language barrier,” Patridge said.

“We are working with the police centers and the community centers in those areas. We are looking at educating and going into those areas and spending a little more time to focus and explain what is happening on April 1. Wherever the people are, they need to be counted because it impacts the whole community and they are part of our community.”

Patridge acknowledged that some areas of the Valley will be harder to count than others. Asked if he would encourage the business community to help raise funds to ensure TV and radio advertising in Spanish on the importance of the census, Patridge said: “There is a certain amount of funding that is available but yes, anything than we can do we must do. What we need more than money is to have the business community out there actively encouraging their employees to fill out the census forms and return them,” Patridge said.

Chairing the McAllen Complete Count Committee is McAllen Police Chief Victor Rodriguez. Rodriguez reiterated what Patridge said.

“We are a nation of numbers. One of the most important numbers is the census number. We get one shot at this every ten years and it is coming up on April 1, 2010,” Rodriguez said.

“That number will determine lots of things for all areas of our community, whether it is education, roads, criminal justice, representation, one (congressional) representative or two. Everything will rely on that one number. That is why it is so important right now.”

Rodriguez said the key aspect of his job on the McAllen committee is raising public awareness of the census.

“We want people to know about Census Day. It is all about being counted. The census population number is the number that people look at to locate businesses, to locate educational facilities, whether or not there is a labor source for businesses or a workforce for retail. It is a number that has many, many, consequences and we ask that everyone who can spread the word about the U.S. Census do so,” Rodriguez said.

Rodriguez said all information requested in the census questionnaire is protected by law. “It cannot be used for anything but the census,” he said. Asked if he was picking up on any resistance to filling out the census forms, Rodriguez said no.

“I am not picking up on that. We have done it 20 different times as a nation. It is becoming like wearing old shoes and the more we do it, the more comfortable we feel about it. That is what we are trying to make sure. Put on those old shoes again. Get counted. It is good for us. It is good for our community,” he said.

Write Steve Taylor

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