February 18, 2000
February 14, 2000 - At a speech before representatives of Hispanic organizations, President Clinton announced new steps to encourage all Americans to participate in Census 2000. In 1990, an estimated 8.4 million people were not counted — many of whom were children, minorities, and low-income individuals.
In launching "Census in Schools" it was noted that in the 1990 Census, nearly half of those not counted were children. For that reason, through this initiative, the Census Bureau has sent more than one million program kits to teachers around the country at all levels, including adult ESL and literacy classes.
The President also announced that the White House web page will now include a link the Census 2000 web-page to allow teachers and others to access a Census in the Schools program kit and other Census information. During March, Census questionnaires will be mailed to 120 million American homes, and so teachers are encouraged to use these materials during "Teach Census Week," March 13-17.
The President went on to state that the challenge is to emphasize that census information is strictly confidential and to direct federal agencies to step up their activities in support of the Census. To make sure every person in America counts, the Census Bureau is already undertaking a massive mobilization involving hundreds of thousands of local census takers and volunteers.
To encourage participation, the President underscored that that individual data obtained in Census 2000 will not be shared with anyone outside of the Census Bureau for any reason. The information will not be available, for instance, to the IRS, the INS, the FBI or any law enforcement agency. No one in state, local or tribal government can get the information; nor can private persons, businesses, credit bureaus or marketing companies. Only Census employees have access to such information, and they are subject to strict criminal penalties for sharing data.
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