Census targets Hispanic response

Christy Mullins

January 11, 2010

Census officials are working harder than ever this year to build relationships with Latinos, a population that has quadrupled in York County since the last census in 2000.

But some undocumented immigrants in York County are wary of the census form because they fear it could send them and their families back to their home countries. The fear persists despite a law that bars officials of the U.S. Census Bureau from sharing personal information with any other agency.

“That’s a new concept to them," said Roberto Belen, a Puerto Rican partnership specialist with the Charlotte Regional Census Center. Since last June, he has peddled the census to Hispanics in 23 counties including York, Chester and Lancaster in South Carolina.

The Hispanic population in York County has increased from 2,196 people in 2000 to 8,601 people in 2008, according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey that year.

In Lancaster County, the numbers jumped from 729 to 2,837 Hispanics in the same eight-year period, and in Chester County, the population soared from 160 Hispanics to 406.

Belen travels to Hispanic churches and businesses, explaining to Latino pastors and business owners - who are most trusted in Hispanic communities to pass along information - why the census is important and safe.

“I turn blue telling them," Belen said. “But they bring baggage: their mistrust of governments in their home countries. They’re so afraid of being caught, losing liberty, being deported. It’s a life-changing thing."

While fear is expected to hold back many Latinos from sending in the forms, Belen said a host of other reasons also are to blame: low education levels, constant moving and a pervasive “survival mode" mentality in the Hispanic community make the 10-question form a distant thought.

Belen pitches to Hispanics that their filling out the census forms only can help.

The more Hispanics counted, the more services and financial help the community will eventually receive from the federal government, including better education, better facilities and more programs targeted to Latinos.

Hispanic females, Belen said, are more receptive to the idea. But no matter how much energy the Census Bureau puts into Hispanic outreach through the media and hefty advertising campaigns, face-to-face trust building is the only way to reach the Latino community.

Meanwhile, members of the Greater York County Latino Association are covering the same paths, talking positively about the census in Hispanic churches and businesses but also using the online sites Facebook and MySpace as bulletin boards for the census.

The Internet and churches have been the best ways to communicate with Hispanics in York County, said Jose Brito, president of the association.

Brito began talking with Latinos about the census in August. He also works in the meat department at Compare Foods supermarket, a Cherry Road grocer that specializes in Hispanic foods.

“We need jobs. We need schools. We need hospitals," Brito said. “The census can bring all of these things if we’re counted."

York County is home to dozens of Latino leaders such as Brito, who drive the census home to hundreds of distrusting Hispanics.

Denise Rivera, a bilingual HIV prevention specialist with the Catawba Care Coalition who provides free HIV testing, counseling and outreach to the Hispanic community, waves the census flag because an accurate count will allow her to do her job more effectively.

“The more Hispanics the federal government sees, the more money will trickle down to agencies like mine," said Rivera, 36.

Juan Petrovich, a Rock Hill real estate agent from Peru, can vouch that the Hispanic community is growing fast, and that more than half of its members are undocumented immigrants.

“The situation is different now," he said, comparing Census 2000 to what officials can expect in 2010 - many more to count this time, and a greater need for outreach.

The Rev. Sunmer Cuesta, a pastor from the Dominican Republic who works with Hispanics at Southside Baptist Church in Rock Hill, said that while he and others push the forms to the Latino community, census officials will need to understand how those Latinos think.

Hispanics “don’t trust people who come to their doors knocking," Cuesta said, referring to census workers who visit people who don’t fill out their forms. “They think it’s the feds, and that scares them."

It’s also important for census officials to reinforce the idea that information shared with them won’t be spread to immigration agencies, he said.

The officials also will need to recognize that many Hispanics, especially undocumented immigrants, work long hours and easily forget about the form sent in the mail.

Margarita Guvman, a 52-year-old unemployed woman from Puerto Rico, has spent 20 years in the United States. In March, she’ll fill out her first census form.

In 2000, Guvman lived in California. A mother of five children, she worked 48 to 52 hours a week and holidays in the manufacturing industry. So when the census form was mailed, she said, she was never home to complete it.

She moved to Rock Hill shortly after and can remember knowing only five Hispanics in town. They hugged in the grocery store, so excited to see one of their own.

“I could count with my fingers how many there were," Guvman said through a translator. “But there’s been rapid growth. We need more services - English programs and clinics would make life so much easier."

Christy Mullins • 803-329-4062

“(Hispanics) bring baggage: their mistrust of governments in their home countries. They’re so afraid of being caught, losing liberty, being deported. It’s a life-changing thing."

a partnership specialist with the Charlotte Regional Census Center Roberto Belen,