April 26, 2021- 9:15 p.m.
New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio on Monday blasted the Cuomo administration over the 2020 Census results that cost the state a seat in Congress — a loss that could have been avoided if just 89 more residents had been counted.
“For God’s sake, if the state had invested in the Census, could you have found 89 more people to count? Sure, easily,” de Blasio said during an appearance on NY1.
“This was a lost opportunity by the state government to get the count right.”
State and local officials had urged residents to participate in the once-a-decade national head count, using ads, text messages, phone calls and even celebrities to get the word out.
But critics charge that the Cuomo administration dragged its feet to dole out millions in funding for census outreach. The funds weren’t released until summer of 2020, when the census was already underway.
“What’s troubling to me is the State of New York clearly did not go that extra mile,” de Blasio said. “They did not put the resources in, they held back money they should have devoted” to the census.
Ultimately, the Empire State’s “self-response rate” — households participating in the census by phone, mail or online — was a little over 64 percent, around the same as in 2010. The national rate was 67 percent.
Hizzoner attributed that response rate to the Big Apple’s outreach efforts.
“I’m very proud of what we did in the city because we’re in the middle of the pandemic and we launched a massive grass roots effort to get people counted — and we managed to reach the same level as 2010 when there was no pandemic,” he said. “That is a miracle.”
Cuomo’s office didn’t immediately return a request for comment on the mayor’s statements.
