A census undercount could cost California billions — and L.A. is famously hard to track

By Sarah Parvini

California Calls, a coalition of community groups, recently created a program focusing on the census and redistricting in African American communities — another group that is at risk of an undercount.

“What’s most in our face is the amount of homelessness that L.A. is seeing, and we know that black folks are disproportionately affected by homelessness,” said Kevin Cosney, the organization’s special projects manager.

California Calls plans on teaming up with other groups and black churches to encourage census participation through phone banks, text message blasts, canvassing and social media campaigns, he said.

Black immigrants, he added, will be particularly hard to reach.

“Some, being Afro-Latino, would have the double whammy of a fear of government and how you’re treated as someone who presents as black on top of potential language barriers and a fear of deportation,” Cosney said.

Source: https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-la-county-census-hard-to-count-20190429-htmlstory.html