20/20 Working Group
"Perfecting Our Census Vision"
Houston International Network
Nonprofit Communications Project/ ACSS, Inc.
ERASING OUR CENSUS UNDERCOUNT
US Census Undercounts cost our region access to billions of federal dollars contributed by Greater Houston taxpayers.
From one Census to the next, our region loses $15,000 per person not counted. This denies our access to the federal dollars for mobility, infrastructure, health, education and public safety funding due Greater Houston, based on our inaccurate population counts.
Our celebrated metropolitan diversity both drives and masks our chronically high undercount rates in every Census. Houston's Census undercounts remain persistent, even with our incremental progress in our 2010 response work.
Undercounts are significant in Greater Houston in communities challenged by language and economic barriers.
Fully 25% of Houstonians reside in households where any one of 140 diverse languages is spoken; while, almost 30% of Houstonians fall below the federal poverty level.
2017 FEB 4 Survey / Houston Language Bank Study / Lunar New Year Houston
2017 FEB 4 Survey / Houston Language Bank Study / Lunar New Year Houston
20 / 20 Working Group - Perfecting Our Census Vision
Houston Language Bank launches this initiative to execute a comprehensive communications plan to effectively reach all language communities and targeted economic groups to build and motivate reliable response for an accurate 202 Census count.
HLB's three-year plan to research, design and construct a multi-layered, network-to-network communications system is the 20 /20 Working Group's singular objective. This nonprofit communications initiative front-end loads committed Census response mechanisms targeted to 'Erase Houston's Undercount' in 2020.
Optimizing Economic Return - 'Follow the Money'
Our Census Undercounts cost our region access to billions in federal dollars due Greater Houston. Immigrant Houstonians, in a single year, paid nearly $3 Billion, just in state and local taxes here.
HOUSTON 2015 DATA
| Houston's 7 'Fortune 500' firms - Founded by Immigrant Families - Global revenue generated - 125,611 Employees |
$ 282.2 Billion in Sales |
HOUSTON 2014 DATA
| GDP (Gross Domestic Product) - Immigrant contribution to Houston |
$ 116.5 Billion |
| SPENDING POWER - By Immigrants in Houston |
$ 31.8 Billion |
| STATE & LOCAL TAXES - Paid by Immigrants |
$ 2.9 Billion |
| BUSINESS INCOME - Generated by Immigrant Businesses |
$ 2.5 Billion |
| MANUFACTURING JOBS - Created by Immigrant Enterprise |
64,224 Jobs |
| SELF-EMPLOYED - % Immigrant Residents - % Total Population |
42.4 % 24.7 % |
Most all Houston area immigrants pay federal income taxes, either as professionals or business owners.
HOUSTON 2012 DATA
| Hispanic-Owned Enterprise - 152,766 Businesses - 100,395 Employees |
$ 21.3 Billion in Sales |
| Asian-Owned Enterprise - 61,304 Businesses - 114,773 Employees |
$ 25.6 Billion in Sales |
But, tens of thousands in our diverse language and low-income communities consistently fail to answer the Census. Hence, Houston's public sector budgets are consistently deprived access to federal funding due our region between US Census counts.
Erasing Houston's Census Undercount is a matter of fiscal due diligence for the future of our region.
Houston's immigrant enterprise dynamic fuels our economic growth, locally and globally. Expanding our access to federal dollars due our region depends on the communication networks initiative of our 20 /20 Working Group plan to Erase the Undercount.
Houston Language Bank's 20 / 20 Working Group Census project commences APRIL 2017
- Posted March 2017
Nonprofit Communications Project / Houston Language Bank / ACSSC, Inc.
