COVINGTON, Ky. - Two weeks into the 2020 Census count, Covington citizens’ response rate is lagging significantly behind that of other Northern Kentucky cities.

 

If more citizens don’t take the few minutes necessary to fill out the form - which can be done online for the first time ever - Covington could stand to lose millions of dollars in federal grant programs.

 

As of April 14, the response rate in Covington is 43 percent. That’s the lowest rate of any of the 10 largest cities in Kenton, Campbell, and Boone counties, and almost 10 percentage points below most of those cities, according to the Census bureau.

 

The highest response rate of those 10 cities is Villa Hills, at 70.5 percent. Others, for example, include Erlanger at 57.7 percent and Independence at 63.2 percent.

 

“We cannot stress enough how important it is to be counted,” Covington Neighborhood Services Director Ken Smith said. “Some 13 percent of the City’s budget comes from direct federal funding that’s allocated based on population counts.”

 

Census Bureau officials say that Covington’s population was undercounted during the last official count in 2010. It’s been estimated that Covington taxpayers could stand to lose out on almost $22 million over the next 10 years if the 2020 Census is no more successful than the 2010 Census in making sure every Covington resident is counted.

 

Covington’s challenge is that it has high levels of historically hard-to-count populations: renters, students, senior citizens, children under 5, transients, immigrants, low-income families, and racial and ethnic minorities.

 

And many of the programs, events, and other efforts to engage those populations have had to be put on hold because of bans on public gatherings and social distancing requirements related to the coronavirus pandemic, Smith said.

 

Those hard-to-count populations stand to benefit substantially from services funded by federal money, which in Covington’s budget is allocated to everything from emergency home repairs to down payment assistance for first-time homebuyers to first-year rent help for small businesses to park renovation and road repair and neighborhood-specific police patrols.

 

Health-care agencies in Covington also receive federal funds allocated based on population.

 

The message from the City, then, is simple, Smith said: Fill out the U.S. Census form. It’s quick, it’s simple, it’s the law, and it’s confidential.

 

Forms can be filled out via paper, phone (1-844-330-2020), and online at 2020census.gov. Two options are presented: for people who have a geographic-specific access code and those who don't.

 

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