2010 Census and Same-Sex Couples

Census forms should arrive in every mailbox on or about March 15 and should be returned in the self-addressed, pre-stamped envelope by April 1.

Each household fills out one form. Person 1 answers 10 questions. Persons 2 through 6 have seven questions to answer. Numbers 7 through 12 fill out just name, sex, age, birth date and check whether or not they are related to person 1.

Octomom will need an additional form, according to Elizabeth Lopez Lyon, the LGBT partnership specialist with the U.S. Census Bureau in Dallas.

Joy Donovan Brandon, the Dallas region’s media specialist, said that the Census Bureau is reaching out to all groups because their goal is counting everyone. That includes the LGBT community — and Lopez Lyon, who has a gay brother and lesbian sister, said she jumped at the chance to fill that position locally, the first ever in the Dallas region that covers a three-state area.

The census has partnered with a number of organizations to encourage participation.

Commerce Secretary Gary Locke appointed Dallas City Councilmember Pauline Medrano as vice chair of the 2010 Census Advisory Committee, which advises on implementation of the census.

More at: Dallas Voice!

2010 Census Will Count Same-Sex Couples

From NPR:

Next year, for the first time, the United States census will count same-sex couples who identify themselves as spouses. Previously these people were identified as unmarried partners. Guest host Jennifer Ludden discusses the effort and its implications for the gay rights movement with demographer Gary Gates; he’s a senior research fellow at the UCLA School of Law, and a member of “Our Families Count,” a census advocacy campaign for the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community.

Listen to the story at: NPR

Power to the GLBT People: Time for Militancy

The reason that gay people have not achieved full civil rights as American citizens is due to the fact that they have not made serious demands that put their fellow citizens at a disadvantage. They have only made requests to reason, fairness, family and civility, which does not seem to be working. It is clearly time to step up the level of engagement with the non-gay majority who is intent on denying them their full civil rights. Unfortunately, no majority gives up its power without a struggle. I suggest a new, non-violent tactic which will ultimately help their movement to prevail.

The 2010 census is hugely important to the country. The gay community and their non-gay allies should refuse to cooperate with the 2010 census. Should such a movement take hold, I would be among the first to refuse to cooperate with a census taker.

More at: Unleashed!

2010 Census Will Report Same-Sex Couples

Peter Dziedzic and his husband, Jay Judas, aren’t quite sure yet which of them will be designated the head of household when they fill out the 2010 census form in April.

Both are employed and make about the same amount of money, Dziedzic, 32, of Boston, Massachusetts, explained recently.

“We’ll just pick … maybe I’ll give it to him, he’s older,” Dziedzic, who legally married Judas, 38, last year, joked.

Regardless of who fills out the census form, the Census Bureau will report their response as a married same-sex couple without changing it.

The 2010 census is the first that will report the numbers of same-sex couples who describe themselves as married, or more specifically, who use the terms husband and wife.

The number of same-sex couples who identify as married will be released separately from the national count on a state-by-state basis, according to Census Bureau reports.

More from this at: WIBW

Census Won’t Count GLBT Couples Til 2020

The U.S. Census has made some efforts to count those in same-sex relationships, and have made attempts to include them in the 2010 Census count, but due to “problems”, the Bureau has announced that married same-sex couples will not be included in official U.S. Census count until 2020.

Statistical problems related to the development of the 2010 census form and the evolving legal state of same-sex relationships led Census officials to conclude that trying to include married gay couples in the overall snapshot of household marital status could yield an inaccurate number, said Gary Gates, a University of California, Los Angeles demographer who has been advising the bureau on gay issues.

Instead, same-sex married couples will be added into the category for unmarried partners, just as they were for the 2000 census. But in a marked policy departure, the agency plans to make the data on same-sex couples who described themselves as married available on a state-by-state basis.

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