Census trying to boost N.M. response

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) - The 2010 Census is here, and officials are hoping to get a head count of everyone living in the United States.

This year the U. S. Census Bureau stepped up the spending and targeted specific groups in hopes of saving money in the long run.

Census forms should be arriving in your mailbox starting this week.

"We want to make sure the message gets to the community," said Veronica Reyes, New Mexico media specialist with the 2010 Census. More than $400 billion will be given out by the government, and how much each community gets depends on the responses to the census form, she said.

In 2000 New Mexico had a 62 per cent return rate, one of the lowest in the nation.

Reyes says the goal of the of the 2010 census is to get 72 per cent of the forms returned completed, which in turn saves taxpayers millions of dollars.

"For each 1 percent we improve the mail return rate nation wide, it will save tax payers about $90 million," Reyes said.

In an effort to make sure everyone is counted the Census launched a massive $335 million ad campaign.

Reyes said they are trying to make the ads as diverse as the population, and here in New Mexico that means reaching out to the rural areas populated with Native Americans. But that's not the only ethnic group the Census is targeting.

"We have advertisements created specifically for the Hispanics," she said. "Some of the ads are in Spanish. We have them for the Asian-American community, the African-American community."

Reyes is urging people to take 10 minutes to fill out the 10 questions and return the form by April 1.

Reyes said many people don't complete the form because of privacy concerns. However the information is confidential and will not be given to anyone else, she said.