It’s been on the road for a few weeks now — and it could come to your neighborhood soon. The Dayton-Montgomery County 2020 Census van offers residents a unique way to get their census responses completed.
Jordan Lewis is a legislative aide for the Dayton City Commission. He says the COVID-19 pandemic has really hampered getting a good census count this year. Normally, census workers would be out canvassing neighborhoods.
“If you look at the state of Ohio's average response rate right now, about 66 percent overall response rates. But we do have parts of the city of Dayton that are still well below that average,” he says.
Lewis says some communities are at 40, 30, even 20 percent response rates.
Those lower response rates can mean less federal funding coming into those neighborhoods over the next ten years.
Lewis says that about 40 households have completed the census through the mobile unit. With an estimated 2.6 people per household, he says that's about 1.8 million dollars in funding for those communities in the next decade.
Individuals, neighborhood associations, and community organizations can book the census van at daytonohio.gov/census.
The city says social distancing and sanitation guidelines are maintained at all times.
