County Planning Director Felipe Oltramari called in additional information about the 2020 Census, stating that officials at the Buffalo (Batavia) Service Processing Center under U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement failed to report the number of persons at the facility this year. In 2010, 612 detainees were counted in the census.
"They were supposed to be reported to the Census Bureau by leadership there, but we did not see that this time around," Oltramari said. "That makes you wonder if those being held at other facilities around the state were counted."
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The inability to get an accurate count of residents in the Genesee County portion of the Tonawanda Indian Reservation contributed to New York State losing a congressional seat following the 2022 election, the county’s planning director said today.
Felipe Oltramari said he learned recently that the Census Bureau’s report of population in the Genesee County segment of the Tonawanda Seneca Nation reservation was not correct because the bureau’s enumerator was not allowed to enter the tribal grounds.
According to the Census Bureau, the population dropped from 483 in 2010 to 241 in 2020 – a stunning 50 percent decline.
“I found out that many residents there did not fill out the 2020 Census form and that the person sent by the Census Bureau was told to leave,” Oltramari said. “New York ended up losing a congressional seat by 89 people, and just on the reservations alone, we lost 242 people. We could have saved that seat.”
Oltramari blames the Census Bureau for not following through on the count at the reservation and also in the Town of Alabama, which lost 14 percent of its population – from 1,869 in 2010 to 1,602 in 2020.
The Genesee County portion of the reservation borders the Town of Alabama.
“You wonder if that same enumerator just quit … as Alabama was the town that lost the most percentage-wise other than the reservation,” Oltramari said. “I think there’s some undercount in both Alabama and the Tonawanda Seneca Reservation.”
The planning director said he is troubled by the fact that the Census Bureau reported it had reached the 99 percent threshold.
“So, we were under the assumption that there was nothing left to do because 60 something percent answered on their own and the remaining 30 something percent was captured through enumeration,” he offered. “Obviously, that didn’t happen. As far as the reservation, what did they get – maybe 50 percent?”
He said the bureau should have hired someone from the reservation to conduct the count beyond those who had already filled out the form. The Census Bureau is responsible for reaching out to tribal areas.
“That is what is supposed to happen in those communities. They go out there and try to hire people within the community, that way the person coming out and doing the enumeration is a neighbor or a resident from the area, and not some stranger from Rochester or where ever,” he said. “It definitely had an impact on our county and the state as a whole – as New York lost that Congressional seat.”
If New York’s population total listed 89 more people, Minnesota would have lost the seat.
Oltramari said COVID-19 could have been a factor in the hiring process as there were delays in contacting potential enumerators and getting them trained in late 2019 and early 2020.
As far as the state’s congressional delegation is concerned, it will have only 26 representatives, continuing a steady decline from its peak of 45 members of the House in the 1940s.
New York’s population grew by 4 percent from 19,421,055 in 2010 to 20,215,751 last year. However, data reveals that many New Yorkers moved to other states, including Florida, which gained about 2.6 million people over the past decade.
