More Mason County residents have responded to the U.S. Census this year than in the past, Mason County Judge-Executive Joe Pfeffer said Friday.

Still he would like to see that number increase even more, he said.

The higher the number, the more revenue the county will be in line for, Pfeffer said. And, when a crisis such as the current pandemic hits, the higher the population count the more resources such as personal protection equipment and funding like the CARES funding is directed to the county, he said.

“Everyone should realize that being counted is important,” Pfeffer said and the pandemic has certainly brought that home.

Currently, 64.7 percent of Mason Countians have filled out and submitted their 2020 Census forms, Pfeffer said. And efforts to pusher those numbers higher are on-going, he said.

“We are reaching out to those who haven’t responded,” Pfeffer said.

The U.S. Census Bureau said it continues to evaluate its operational plans to collect and process 2020 Census data and recently announced updates to those plan that will include enumerator awards and hiring of more employees to accelerate the completion of data collection and counts by Dec. 31, 2020.

As part of the revised plan, Census officials said they will conduct additional training sessions and provide awards to enumerators in recognition of those who maximize hours worked.

Bureau officials said field data collection will end by Sept. 30, 2020. Self-response options will also close on that date to permit the commencement of data processing.

“Under this plan, the Census Bureau intends to meet a similar level of household responses as collected in prior censuses, including outreach to hard-to-count communities,” officials said.

Other local response rates included:

Bracken County — 63,5 percent

Fleming County — 66.3 percent

Lewis County — 56.5 percent

Robertson County — 53,8 percent

Adams County — 58.9 percent

Brown County — 63.9 percent.

Statewide, 66 percent of Kentuckians have submitted their Census forms, as have 67.5 percent of Ohio residents.

For more information on the 2020 Census visit 2020census.gov