An accurate census count of the population of Connecticut and other states is an enormously complex task this year because of the public health challenge of the COVID-19 pandemic.

In response to recent troubling announcements from the U.S. Census Bureau, we call for a change of direction by the federal government to respond to the pandemic by allocating sufficient time and resources to produce a safe and accurate data collection operation. Now is not the time to rush census fieldwork or to shortcut data compilation tasks.