Census preparations

Schenectady's population has been declining since our industrial heyday in the 1950s. There was a minor scandal during the previous decennial census which caused more than one city official to declare that we were under counted for political reasons. The official population stands just below 62000. New York politics is way too complicated to explain in a blog, so I'll leave that at that, but the upshot is that the city really, really wants to make sure that every resident is counted.

Federal and NY State funding relies on the population count as well as the byzantine NY State Education Department calculations on school aid distribution. So many programs rely on the population count that it's become one of the key indicators (as crazy as that sounds.)

Apparently the Census people have an equally strong desire to get the count right, because they've given money to the city to buy advertising, to prepare us to be tallied. I picked up this t-shirt at a public meeting reviewing the city's block grant development program. It's not just a generic census shirt - it has the city seal on the upper left breast with the mayor's name as well.