If you haven’t mailed back your 2010 Census questionnaire or you did not receive one, you can expect a knock at your door sometime between May1 and mid-July. Beginning Saturday, nearly 19,000 census takers will fan out across North Carolina going door-to-door to collect information from households that have not answered the census.

“I congratulate North Carolina because happily, 74 percent of households have mailed back the census questionnaire,” said William W. Hatcher, regional director of the U.S. Census Bureau. “Now, we must knock on doors where our records indicate we have not received a completed census form for whatever reason. We hope people will cooperate with census takers in this nonresponse follow-up because the census is so important to the state. We are constitutionally mandated to count everyone, and that’s what we plan to do.”

The national mail participation rate was 72 percent.

North Carolina was among the first four states in the nation to exceed its mail participation rate from Census 2000 (66 percent). All five states in the Charlotte census region surpassed their Census 2000 mail participation rates by the April 16 mail-return deadline. The Charlotte Regional Census Center supports 2010 Census operations in Kentucky, the Carolinas, Tennessee and Virginia. Hatcher noted that some households might not have received a census form for a variety of reasons. For instance, people might live in an area where the forms weren’t deliverable to a geographical address, the address might be incomplete, households might be part of a special census operation, or the residence might be a new construction.

“Every phase of the census has the potential for problems, but we have subsequent operations designed to correct the problem and get the best count possible,” Hatcher said. “If you did not get a census form, you will be visited in our follow-up operation. You will be counted.”

Census takers are hired to work in their own neighborhoods. They are sworn to secrecy for life and face a fine of up to $250,000 and/or five years imprisonment for violating the oath. Title 13 of the U.S. Code prohibits sharing of personal data and requires census participation.

Hatcher said the 18,589 census takers who will comb North Carolina streets will wear official identification badges with the words “U.S. DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE,” the census taker’s name, and the words “U.S. BUREAU OF THE CENSUS.” An employee should have a black workbag with “U.S. Census Bureau” on it and an official seal.

“Anyone who is worried should ask the census taker for identification,” Hatcher said. “You can ask for the local census office phone number and call to verify employment. We want people to feel safe so that census workers can safely do their jobs.”

For more information about how to identify an official census taker, go to www.census2010.gov.