AUGUST 27, 2009 ISSUE
U.S. Census Office Slated to Open in Boone in December
An office in Boone for the U.S. Census Bureau will open later this year to recruit personnel for the 2010 population count.
“We’re opening 10 offices across North Carolina,” said Tony Jones, regional media relations officer with the Census Bureau.
“We’re just hiring management now,” he said, adding that the recruitment for management positions occurred this spring.
The Boone office will be located at 148 Highway 105 Extension, Suite 105. Additionally, offices will open in Asheboro, Concord, Durham, Gastonia, Hickory, Raleigh, Rocky Mount, Wilmington and Winston-Salem. Some offices are slated to open in December and some will open in January, Jones said, adding that the Boone office is tentatively scheduled for opening in early December.
The 10 offices across the state will recruit for more than 10,000 positions in all, and about 1,100 positions will be available for the Boone office, Jones said. The Boone office will cover the counties of Ashe, Avery, Burke, Caldwell, McDowell, Mitchell, Watauga and Yancey.
The positions can be part time or fulltime, “depending on what people are willing to work,” he said.
The majority of the positions are for field workers, who conduct non-response follow-ups and are paid $13.50 an hour, he added.
“We will send out census questionnaires in mid-March of 2010, and if you don’t return the forms, these people come knocking on your door,” Jones said.
Non-response follow-ups typically begin in late April or early May and can run through July, he added.
“The goal for non-response [employees] is to work in their neighborhoods because they know their neighborhoods best,” he said. “They work in areas they’re familiar with.”
After the non-response ends, some quality control operations will continue, but these do not require as many personnel, Jones said, adding that the Boone census office will close when census operations end, most likely in early fall 2010.
“[The census] is about money and power,” Jones said.
Census numbers help determine how more than $400 billion in federal funds is distributed back to towns, cities and municipalities, he said. That money is used to improve infrastructure and to build schools, hospitals and fire stations.
Census numbers are also given to the individual state legislatures, who in turn, redraw congressional and political lines according to where the people are, Jones added.
“The lines will probably be redrawn in 2011, once the numbers are out,” he said.
As a result of the 2000 census, North Carolina gained a seat in Congress for District 13, he said.
Job opportunities for the 10 offices set to open in December and January will be posted online in the latter part of the fall this year, Jones said.
For more information, click to www.census.gov in late fall.
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