By Scott Pohl, WKAR
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/wkar/local-wkar-899602.mp3
LANSING, MI –
Local census workers have begun going door-to-door, visiting people who have not returned their census forms.
Workers from the Lansing census office had already canvassed student-rental areas around Michigan State University, hoping to find people before final exams week. Over the weekend, other non-response follow-up work began elsewhere in the seven counties coordinated in Lansing.
Dichondra Johnson-Geiger of the Lansing census office wants people to know that census takers carry a watermarked badge. The identification of a census worker can also be verified with a call to the census office.
"If someone feels they've been approached by someone that is not a census taker," Johnson-Geiger says, "they are instructed to call 9-1-1."
Johnson-Geiger says census workers will only ask the same ten questions that are on the census form. That means they don't ask for social security numbers of anything of a financial nature.