census – C-VILLE Weekly

Make room: City, county see population growth in 2020 Census

It’s not your imagination—it is getting more crowded around here. Charlottesville and Albemarle are both more populous than they were a decade ago, according to newly released census data. The 2020 census was delayed thanks to the pandemic, but the Census Bureau shared its first tranche of data last week.

The City of Charlottesville had 43,475 residents in 2010 and now has 46,553, meaning 7 percent more people live here than a decade ago. Albemarle County grew at approximately twice the rate of the city during that stretch, going from 98,970 residents in 2010 to 112,395 in 2020, a roughly 14 percent increase in population. The city and county combined have more than 16,000 more residents than in 2010.

Some of Albemarle’s rural neighboring counties in central Virginia saw significant population growth as well. Greene County has 12 percent more people than it did in 2010 and Louisa has 13 percent more.

The state as a whole got 8 percent more populous. That growth was most concentrated in northern Virginia—Loudoun County has 35 percent more residents than it did 10 years ago. Some regions of the state decreased in population, as well. The three counties with the most significant population loss were Lee, Wise, and Buchanan, down at the Old Dominion’s very southwestern tip. Each lost between 12 and 15 percent of its population.

Comedian Trevor Moore passes away

Comedian and Charlottesville native Trevor Moore passed away unexpectedly last week at age 41. Moore attended Covenant High School and got his start on Charlottesville area public access television before becoming nationally known for sketch comedy work with his group Whitest Kids U Know. He went on to work for Comedy Central and direct multiple films.

“Making @itrevormoore really laugh always gave me a sense of accomplishment. I’m so lucky I got to spend the last 20 years trying to get good at that,” tweeted long-time Whitest Kids U Know collaborator Sam Brown after hearing news of Moore’s death.

The Whitest Kids U Know skits, which aired from 2006 to 2011, have a spontaneous, early-internet-era charm. In “Sex Robot,” a cardboard-and-tinfoil robot parades down a residential street while techno music plays. And in “Lincoln,” the group reveals that Abraham Lincoln was assassinated not for his political views but because he was persistently heckling other audience members at Ford’s Theater from his presidential box.

On July 8, Moore tweeted, “When I die I want the obituary to refer to me as ‘local sexpot.’” Rest in peace Trevor Moore, local sexpot.

“One brave woman, Heather Heyer, a young civil rights activist, was murdered while representing the best of us. Her life and activism are reminders that while we have never fully lived up to the promise of America, we have never fully walked away from it either.”
President Joe Biden, in a statement commemorating the four-year anniversary of August 12.

In brief

Third shot available for some

The Blue Ridge Health District is offering a third dose of Pfizer and Moderna vaccines to immunocompromised individuals, the health district announced on Monday. The new initiative is in line with federal guidance as coronavirus cases rise locally and nationally.

Show your cards

The Jefferson and The Southern have announced a new vaccine requirement: In order to enter the venues, all event attendees will be required to show their vaccine cards or proof of a negative COVID test within 48 hours of a show. That’s what we like to hear!

Incident postponed

The String Cheese Incident rescheduled its August 19 Ting Pavilion show, along with two other upcoming tour dates, citing the current wave of new coronavirus cases. The jam band will come to Charlottesville in April instead. At press time, the Pavilion’s August 17 Louis the Child show and upcoming slate of Fridays After Five performances will go ahead as scheduled.

The String Cheese Incident. Publicity photo.

It’s about the journey

Albemarle County’s Jack Jouett Elementary will be renamed Journey Elementary in July 2022, the school board decided last week. Jouett was a local Revolutionary War soldier and slave owner. It’s not the first name change in recent years: In 2019, the county changed Cale Elementary to Mountain View Elementary after segregationist comments from former superintendent Paul H. Cale saw the light of day.

Hot number

You’re reading the 33rd issue of the 33rd year of C-VILLE Weekly. Must be your lucky day.

Counting up: Pay raise for census takers reflects the importance of getting the numbers right

With a new decade comes a new census. Starting March 12, every household across the country will receive a letter in the mail, explaining how to respond to the 2020 census by phone, mail, or—for the first time ever—online.

Census data is used to redraw legislative districts, determining the amount of seats each state is allotted in the House of Representatives, as well as to appropriately distribute more than $675 billion in government funding to communities across the country.

“The census is tied to everything, from health care to housing to social services,” says Kathy O’Connell, who works for the division of the census that oversees Virginia. “It’s extremely important that we have a good count of who lives in a particular place.”

To catch those who don’t respond on their own, the bureau also employs census takers to go door to door and record responses in person. And it is looking to hire hundreds right here in Charlottesville.

“We need large numbers,” says O’Connell, “We are [especially] interested in candidates with language abilities.”

To encourage more people to apply, the bureau has raised the pay for census workers to $22 an hour in Charlottesville and $21.50 in Albemarle County. Other perks include paid training, weekly paychecks, mileage reimbursement, and flexible hours.

Some populations are underrepresented in the data, particularly young people and immigrant communities. Our local Complete Count Committee includes a subcommittee focused on ensuring that refugees and immigrants are aware of the census, as well as identifying and addressing what prevents these populations from participating, such as limited English proficiency and mistrust of the government, says committee co-chair Caitlin Reinhard.

To subvert the many misconceptions surrounding the census, the subcommittee is emphasizing to local communities that the census is confidential, and that “it will have a huge impact on the resources and representation available [to them] over the next 10 years,” Reinhard says.

The Census Bureau is also partnering with a variety of local organizations to increase its outreach. Here in Charlottesville, the International Rescue Committee has created postcards and posters in 10 different languages about the census, along with other informational materials.

“It’s hugely important—now more than ever—that their voices are heard,” says Reinhard, who is also the resettlement manager for the IRC, “and that they are counted as people who make up this great country, whether or not they’re citizens.” (The Trump administration’s attempt to add a question about citizenship status was struck down by the Supreme Court.)

Lakshmi Fjord, a visiting scholar at UVA’s Department of Anthropology, has witnessed the consequences of inadequate census data firsthand. As Dominion Energy worked to build a natural gas compressor station in the historically African American community of Union Hill, the company used broad data from the 2010 census to claim that the area was sparsely populated and predominantly white.

However, by conducting a door-to-door count of the population, Fjord showed that Union Hill has a greater population density than all other parts of the county, with 83 percent minority residents—meaning the compressor would disproportionately (and illegally) affect African Americans. (The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals repealed Dominion’s permit last month.)

“It’s well known that in particularly rural, and maybe everywhere in African American communities, there is far less chance people will open their door to census takers…[so] we trusted elders from the community to go door-to-door,” Fjord says. “This is also an important thing for the census. You cannot just hire eager young people to go around because there’s just not a sense of who they are.”

For this reason, O’Connell strongly encourages residents who are from the local community and know it well to apply to be census takers. Applications are available now at 2020census.gov.