NOORVIK, Alaska (AP) — The U.S. Census Bureau is launching its 2010 count of the nation’s residents in a remote Alaska village.
Census Bureau Director Robert Groves is flying to Noorvik in northwest Alaska on Monday to count the first household in the Inupiat Eskimo community of 650. Villagers have prepared a day of festivities to welcome Groves and other visiting federal, state and tribal officials.
Census workers and trained locals are expected to take a week to interview the rest of Noorvik’s residents, using the same 10-question forms to be mailed to most Americans on March 15. Census workers also will visit 217 other rural Alaska communities in the coming weeks.
Alaskans in rural communities not linked by roads have been the first Americans counted since the 1990 census.
