Census Outreach

Reaching “hard to count” populations.

To ensure a complete census count in Napa County, the CLC, as part of the Napa County Complete Count Committee, oversaw and led the work of reaching 'hard to count' populations, partnering with 20 public and private agencies in our direct outreach efforts.

Napa County increased the Census response rate by 2.3% (compared to the statewide 1.4% increase) over the 2010 Census response rates. Over half of the Census tracts reported higher response rates than in 2010. On average, the response rate in hard-to-count tracts increased by 2.1%. We see this as a tremendous success given the impacts of COVID-19, two major wildfires in 2020, and the ever-changing Census deadlines. Through this work, we cultivated lasting relationships with the community, local government, and many non-profit partners. 

Using Human Centered Design, we learned more about 'hard to count' communities through empathy interviews. These interviews informed our messaging and outreach techniques. We launched a tri-lingual messaging and outreach campaign specifically targeting hard-to-count communities. We continually used data to better guide, target, and prioritize our outreach efforts.