If you didn’t mail in your census form before the deadline, chances are good that someone was sent to knock on your door to get the information. That’s what I did during the month of May – I worked for the Census Bureau as an enumerator. More under the fold.
The biggest challenge
I discovered that my biggest problem was trying to get inside an apartment or condo building. Lots of places have signs that say, "Don't let strangers in the building!"
I dialed a lot of numbers on security systems. "Hi, I’m from the U.S. Census; can you buzz me in?" I spent a lot of time waiting for someone to walk in or out of the building. "Hi, there. I’m from the Census. Here’s my I.D. badge. Would you mind letting me in?" A few times, I waited outside a building for 20-30 minutes (in the ever-present Seattle rain) trying to get in before I gave up.
At one building, some guy unlocked the front door but wouldn’t let me in the building. He said, "You should use the security system to call the people who didn’t fill out their forms." I said, "We know the names of the people who mailed in their census forms. I need to go to the places where people didn’t mail the form. So I don’t know their names. That’s the whole point." He still didn’t let me in.
In my first two weeks I worked in one district (Seattle’s Capitol Hill), but we started to run out of work and I got transferred to another district (South Lake Union and Downtown). If you know the city of Seattle, imagine a triangle drawn from Broadway (Capitol Hill) to Pike Place Market to the southern edge of Lake Union. Both districts were in that triangle. I probably knocked on 400-500 doors (sometimes more than once) – and I was assigned only one actual house. All of the others were either apartments or condos. With security systems.
Lots of boredom interspersed with occasional excitement
The first thing about knocking on doors is that it’s mostly boring. You knock once, there’s no answer. You wait 15-20 seconds and knock again, still no answer. You mark the date and time on the Enumerator Questionnaire (EQ) form and write NC (for No Contact) or NV (on the first visit, I’d leave a Notice of Visit with my phone number). There was a rule: we were allowed to make only three visits to a Housing Unit (HU). After three attempts, we were expected to find a proxy – an apartment building manager or a neighbor, for example.
Sometimes someone would answer the door (usually by opening it very slightly, but sometimes by looking through the peephole and shouting, "who is it?"). That’s when the excitement would begin.
From their point of view, I was a total stranger they’d never seen before and suddenly I was knocking on their door. I could be a rapist or somebody trying to steal their identity. Several people asked, "How did you get in the building?" One woman copied down my name, my Census I.D. number, the phone number of the Seattle Census office, and the name of my supervisor. Which didn’t bother me because it made her feel better. And she answered all the questions, which was good because it became a Completed Interview (CI).
From my point of view I knew that to them I was an unexpected visitor. Maybe I knocked on their door when they were in the middle of something: preparing dinner or taking a nap or watching their favorite TV show. A couple of people said they were getting ready to go to work and one person had just gotten out of the shower. Also, I was a little worried I might encounter someone who was paranoid about the government gathering information. Or I might get someone with a vicious dog or someone with a gun or someone who had been tweaking on meth for three days without sleeping.
Maybe I was little bit scary to them and maybe they were a little bit scary to me.
But the good news is...
Most people are nice
When someone came to the door, I’d show my official badge and say, "Hi. I’m from the Census. We didn’t get your census form in the mail. Do you have a few minutes to answer the questions?" The script we were given said "it will take less than ten minutes," but in reality it was usually less than five minutes, especially if there were only one or two people who lived there.
The most common reaction I got was, "Oh, I’m really sorry. I meant to send it in but I put it off. I’m really sorry." To which I’d reply, "No problem. If everybody sent in their form, I wouldn’t have gotten this job. Thanks for not mailing it. So, did you live here on April 1st?"
The second most common reaction was, "Census? I already mailed it." To which I’d say, "According to our records, we haven’t received it. Do you mind answering a few questions? It will only take a couple of minutes." Usually they’d answer the questions. Name, sex, birthday, Hispanic/Latino, race, etc.
The third most common reaction was, "This is a bad time," followed by "I’m getting ready for work" or "I have friends visiting" or "you woke me up" or whatever. Then I’d say, "I can take your phone number and do the interview over the phone or I can set up an appointment and come back when it’s convenient." When they knew I’d keep bugging them, they’d usually say "How long will it take?" and I’d say, "A few minutes." And I’d get a Completed Interview.
Most people were nice and most apartment/condo managers were nice, too. Maybe it’s a Seattle thing. Or maybe I just have a pleasant way of dealing with people. One condo manager was an asshole – she kept asking me, "Legally, how much information am I required to give you?" Here’s a general rule for life: Avoid people who start their sentences with the word "Legally..."
Even though most people were nice...
Some people were assholes
One guy refused to give me his name or his girlfriend’s name ("It’s none of your business"). I told him that was fine – he could refuse to answer any question. He had no problem giving me birthdays or race or sex. He didn’t want me to know the names.
Another guy just refused to answer any questions and told me to go away. I got his information from a proxy (a neighbor). She told me that he was recently diagnosed with cancer; she said he’s not in a good mood.
One woman called me after I left a Notice of Visit (NV) on her door and several others. She told me apartment #XX was vacant, so I shouldn’t go there again. I thanked her for the information. Then I asked her apartment number. She said she was in apartment #YY, which was one of the EQs I had to complete, so I asked if she could give me her information over the phone. She said she already mailed in the census form and she had a three year old and a five year old (and I could hear them screaming in the background). I asked for her name and the kids’ names, but she said, "I already sent in the form. Leave me alone!"
Another guy answered the door and said, "You woke me up. I work nights and now I won’t be able to get back to sleep. How did you get into the building? Leave me alone." Which I totally sympathize with. The second time I went to his door, I didn’t knock on it, but I left a "Notice of Visit." A day later, he called me and yelled at me. He told me he worked nights and I could find everything about him on the internet. But I got him to calm down and I filled out his form over the phone.
I have to mention the weird guy at bus stop. He saw my official Census shoulder bag and asked, "Is it true that if you don’t send in your Census, Homeland Security will bash down your door and haul you away in handcuffs?" I said, no that’s not true, but if you didn't mail your form someone will probably knock on your door. Then he told me, "I’m being stalked by a crazy guy. He says he doesn’t hate women, but he wants to kill them all, so you can understand why I’m pretty careful about opening my door." I reassured him. We’re part of the Commerce Department. We’re not Homeland Security. And we don’t give any info other people – not even to the FBI or IRS or the police.
What’s the purpose of the Census?
A couple people asked me "Why does the government need this information?" I usually replied with some variation of this: "Well, it’s mostly so they can figure out how many people live in a state, so they can draw new districts for the House of Representatives. But they also use the statistical information to plan for schools or hospitals or highways or mass transit. And the information is secret; we won’t give it to other government agencies, not even the local police. The government does a census every ten years. The first one was in 1790."
People pretty much said something like, "OK. That makes sense."
The two most important rules of enumerating
Training lasted four days at the end of April. We got fingerprinted twice (one set for the FBI and one for I don’t know who). The training was pretty boring. Have you ever been in a classroom where the teacher explains something and you understand it the first time, but people in the class ask stupid questions about the thing that was just explained twenty seconds ago? It was like that over and over.
The first most important rule was about PII. That’s Personally Identifiable Information. Name, age, race, address, phone – things that could identify someone. And if we wrote down PII on a notepad, we had to turn in the paper to be shredded. We were told that we could be fined or sent to jail for divulging PII to a friend, a spouse, a co-worker, anyone. Perhaps you noticed that I haven’t mentioned any names or addresses that could identify anyone? Also, if I did meet someone famous like, for example, someone connected with a local sports team (not that I’m saying I did or didn’t), I couldn’t tell you their name or where they lived.
The second most important rule was no overtime. If we worked more than 40 hours in a week, we’d get paid overtime for those extra hours and then we’d be immediately fired.
That's about it. If a census worker knocked on your door, I hope you were nice.