By Will Chavez
Staff Writer 

TAHLEQUAH, Okla. – The U.S. Census Bureau is still in need of workers to help conduct the 2010 Census in 23 eastern Oklahoma counties. 

Jan Stephens, a Cherokee Nation Career Services special assistant, said the tribe is continuing to work the U.S. Census Office in Tahlequah as it recruits and hires people. 

“The Cherokee Nation has been very helpful in the census effort, providing use of their facilities and getting out information,” Anthony Sottile, the Tahlequah-area Census manager, said.

Sottile could not say how many more census positions are open, but crew leaders and enumerators are needed. His office announced in February that 1,000 people would need to be hired to cover the 23 eastern counties.

Based on the 2000 Census, the area covered by this group of employees would include 225,000 households and a population of 1 million people. 

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the jobs pay well but are temporary. The amount of pay depends on position and location, and work-related mileage is reimbursed. 

Stephens said she has been assisting the Census Office with scheduling CN conference rooms in the Tribal Complex for training. The CN is also placing census information, including tribally-themed posters, throughout the area. 

She said Career Services is also opening up its 10 field offices, located within the tribe’s 14-county jurisdiction, to be used for census questionnaire sites. These sites will allow people to come in and answer the census questionnaire. 

The U.S. Census Bureau is asking people to take just 10 minutes to answer 10 questions.
Oklahoma’s response rate to the 2000 census was 14 percent below the national rate, Sottile said. Because of that response rate, Oklahoma lost a congressional seat and billions of federal dollars. 

The goal of the 2010 Census, Sottile said, is to regain a congressional seat and the billions of dollars that can be used for housing and infrastructure improvements, which would in turn employ thousands of Oklahomans. 

Reach Staff Writer Will Chavez at (918) 207-3961 or will-chavez@cherokee.org