It’s Not a Good Weather Report for Census 2030: It Feels Like Census Groundhog Day, With A Near-Repeat of Last Decade

It’s Not a Good Weather Report for Census 2030: It Feels Like Census Groundhog Day, With A Near-Repeat of Last Decade

Hear we go again. After cancelling essential Field Tests in the run up to the 2020 Decennial Census, the U.S. Commerce Department just announced: a major cut in the number of 2030 tests sites, from six to two; elimination of previously announced language tests; and introduction of a controversial plan to hire U.S. Postal Service staff to replace temporary Census workers.

Cancellation of the 2020 tests were part of the conditions that lead to quality issues in the 2020 Census results. The 2026 test was officially touted to respond to 2020 lessons-learned and to help the Census Bureau improve the accuracy of the country’s upcoming once-a-decade head count. A mix of communities in six states as well as a national sample of households were announced by the Bureau as part of the original testing strategy.

Stakeholders are expected to ask hard questions about the need to so dramatically scale back the testing plan, what is behind the new approach, and insist upon greater transparency about the changes. Among the most serious concerns is the dramatic scaling back of tests in Tribal lands and rural areas, the elimination of language testing on the 2030 questionnaire, and how the new arrangement with the U.S. Postal Service will work and improve data quality and non-response issues, especially in rural areas.

Watch this space and follow our website as The Census Project monitors the 2026 Census Bureau operations.