Low census responses causing concern
By Neal A. Shipman
Farmer Editor
A very low self-reporting response rate by McKenzie County residents for the 2020 Census has local officials concerned.
“It’s frustrating. We know that we have had people leave the county,” states Daniel Stenberg of the McKenzie County Complete Count Committee. “But the Census Bureau wants to know where people were living on April 1, 2020.”
Stenberg believes that some of the low reporting numbers are a result of oil and gas workers who left the county as jobs were lost when oil prices starting crashing in early March. But that still doesn’t explain the low response rate by county residents.
“We’re in the bottom 10 percent of the state’s counties when it comes to response rate of residents completing the 2020 Census,” states Stenberg.