Clarion census director says county needs to step up pace

Clarion County residents aren’t responding to the U.S. census, and that could cost the county thousands of dollars.

“There are some areas of Clarion that are doing OK and there is a good handful that are not doing so well,” Brett Whitling, the county’s census director, told county commissioners Tuesday.

Whitling said Clarion is ranked 56th out of 67 counties in Pennsylvania in response to the census.

“The lowest response we have right now is Callensburg Borough at 17.2%,” said Whitling. “The best response has been in Knox Township with 74.2%.”

Whitling said the state response is 58.6%, and Clarion County’s average is about 50%.

“The census makes a big difference not only to the county but to libraries, schools and public safety,” said Whitling. “It impacts funding for our 9-1-1. It is something we just don’t want to take for granted.”

The U.S. Census Bureau curtailed activities during the peak of the coronavirus epidemic.

“We at the Census Bureau are deciding to resume operations based on public health guidance,” said Dwayne Lehman, the partnership coordinator for the U.S. Census Bureau in western Pennsylvania and northern Ohio.

One area of concern locally is to make sure the students attending Clarion University are properly counted.

“We are working with Clarion University to be sure that they are providing the correct response for all of the students who would have been living on campus on April 1, 2020,” said Lehman. “We want to be certain those students living off campus complete the census. They should respond as if they were living at that address on April 1 and not where they might be living now.”

“We are reaching out to campus community leaders so they can communicate that message to their student body,” Lehman added.

Lehman said that since Clarion County entered into Gov. Tom Wolf’s yellow phase, census employees will be in the field to validate addresses. He said the census employees will leave a hard copy of the census form at the location.

Lehman said all census employees will be properly identified, and he said “there is no interpersonal action during this phase.”

“The time is now to respond,” said Lehman. “We are asking every organization, every partner we have collaborated with in Clarion County to get the word out.”

Lehman said the census has pushed back the operational timeline. The field workers are tentatively scheduled to begin making their visits July 1, and the date of collection has been extended to Sept. 10.

“Clarion County really needs to complete the census,” county commissioner Ed Heasley said. “We heard from PEMA that we could possibly lose $264,000 in funding for our 9-1-1 center. A lot of that funding is based on the population.”