WASHINGTON, March 24 (UPI) -- The U.S. Census Bureau says it is set to launch a $250 million ad campaign, partly to reach millions of minority group members who may be overlooked.
Census officials, fearing that many Asian, African-American and Hispanic U.S. residents living in hard-to-reach in urban areas won't make it into the count, will use more than half of the money to place ads in traditional and social media in an effort to encourage them to participate, The Washington Post reported Tuesday.
The agency also says it will hire 2,000 temporary employees in the coming months to help coordinate federal efforts with more than 10,000 local teams in a push to elicit more minority participation. Meanwhile, corporations such as General Mills and Target, as well as the NAACP, will encourage U.S. minority residents to fill out 2010 census forms, the Post said.
"While the census is a federal responsibility, there must be earlier and ongoing communication and accountability to local governments and communities," Stacey Cumberbach, New York City's census coordinator, told the U.S. House of Representatives Oversight and Government Reform subcommittee at a hearing Monday.
