www.roanoke.com

The decennial U.S. Census is a 2010 thing, but all the groundwork to make the Big Count happen is already underway. Workers are in the field, and their presence has apparently prompted some concerned calls from residents not sure about them, which further prompted a re-assuring news release from the U.S. Census Bureau, which in turn prompted me to write something for Tuesday's paper:

That weirdo staring at your house and holding something that looks like a camera might not be a weirdo after all.

It could be a representative of the U.S. Census. Not everyone can tell the difference, apparently, and people have been calling census offices to make sure.

The bureau put out a news release Monday to help the public recognize its address listers.

Some 3,000 census workers are in the field in Virginia right now building the address lists that will be the mailing list for the 2010 Census forms. That work will continue through midsummer.

They wear official identification badges and carry handheld computers that they use for data entry. They also might be carrying workbags with "U.S. Census Bureau" on them.

"Anyone who is worried by someone gazing at his house or knocking at her door should ask for identification," said William Hatcher, regional director in the Charlotte Regional Census Center, the hub for census operations in Virginia and four other states.

Feel free to ask for the census worker's name and the phone number of the local census office to call for verification, Hatcher said. "We want residents to feel safe so that census workers can safely do their jobs."

Katie Blixt Cody, spokeswoman for the Census Bureau, said that she wasn't aware of any specific incidents or confusion in Roanoke. "One thing that we have heard is that the handheld computers can look like cameras, because the lister has to hold it up to get the GPS map spot," she said.

"We really just want to alleviate concerns and let people know we are out there."

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