LEWISTON, Idaho — The U.S. Census Bureau has reported that Hawaii is among six other states and Puerto Rico with the highest overall census response rate.
The federal government conducts the census every 10 years as required by the Constitution as an official count of everyone living in the country. The official census day is April 1, but the count can take months to complete.
Census results are used to redistrict or redraw political boundaries for congressional and state legislative districts to ensure populations are balanced. The results also influence federal funding.
The Census Bureau said it has already counted 98.7% of all households across the country. Alaska, Arkansas, Hawaii, Maine, Vermont, West Virginia and Puerto Rico joined Idaho at the top of the response rates.
As of Saturday, Hawaii's statewide enumeration rate stood at 99.9% and its self-response rate with people responding online, by mail or by phone stood at 62.8%. In followup contacts, 37.2% were counted.
As of Tuesday, 99.9% of households in Idaho have been counted, The Lewiston Tribune reported. Among the responses, 69.1% responded online, by mail or over the phone and 30.8% waited until workers knocked on their doors.
The Trump administration had originally planned for the census to be completed by Wednesday. Last week, the date was extended to the end of October after local governments and civil rights groups successfully sued the administration arguing the shortened deadline could lead to inaccurate counts of minorities and other hard-to-count populations.
A federal judge ordered the Census Bureau to text every 2020 census worker by Friday, letting them know the head count of every U.S. resident is continuing through the end of the month and not ending next week, as the agency previously had announced in violation of her court order.
HPR News Staff contributed to this report.
