The U.S. Census is really bad at counting LGBTQ people.
In fact, the government has never had an accurate counting of states’ lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans or other queer residents.
That means the $675 billion allocated from the federal budget to states each year for anti-poverty programs likely isn’t reaching as many LGBTQ people as it could because the government doesn’t collect accurate data on them. As one of the larger states in the country — and as a state with a significant LGBTQ population — that could mean New Jersey is missing out on funding for its residents.
“There’s just so much we don’t know about the discrimination happening against this community,” said Kyle Velte, an associate law professor at the University of Kansas. Velte has studied why the Census Bureau doesn’t collect data on sexual orientation and gender identity and said she couldn’t find a clear answer.
“My gut tells me it’s a political question,” she said. “It’s about the optics of including that question and the optics when the president is running for re-election.”
Instead of asking questions on the once-a-decade census or the monthly American Community Survey about a person’s sexuality and their gender identity, those surveys only ask questions about same-sex marriages and unmarried same-sex partnerships.
During the Obama administration, the bureau considered asking several questions about sexuality and gender identity on the 2020 Census. But those questions have been scrapped under the Trump administration. Leslie Malone, a public affairs specialist with the Census Bureau, explained in an email that the Census Bureau has “specific criteria” a question must meet before it’s added to the Census or the American Community Survey.
“Federal agencies must request the data and have a statutory or regulatory need for the data. We don’t have a current request for sexual orientation or gender identity that meets those criteria,” Malone said. “Asking questions on a survey is always a balance. It’s a balance between the government’s need for information and limiting the burden on the people who respond.”
While the census may count LGBTQ people as individuals, their status as LGBTQ is not. That means the federal money based on census data can’t flow directly to LGBTQ people and the communities where they live. A 2012 study in California, for example, revealed that 40% of homeless youth who seek out services are LGBTQ. Many shelters and social service agencies are funded by federal block grants. Accurate federal data on the problem could mean more resources to people and organizations that need it, Velte said.
The data we do have, however, is a first step to understanding New Jersey’s LGBTQ residents and the cities and towns where they live.
The bureau estimates that 22,418 same-sex couples live in New Jersey, but that data couldn’t be broken down by county or town. Same-sex marriage has been legal in New Jersey since 2013 and in the U.S. since 2015.
So NJ Advance Media examined census data on how many unmarried same-sex couples live in each New Jersey town and city.
Topping the list of places with the most same-sex couples is Jersey City, with the census listing 711 same-sex households. Newark comes in second with 185 same-sex households, and North Bergen is third with 139.
Riverdale Borough in Morris County and Independence Township in Warren County top the list for the towns with the highest concentrations of same-sex households — each has around 2,000 residents and about 3% of the households are same-sex. That’s around 60 to 70 same-sex households in each town.
Additional data, published by the Williams Institute at the University of California Los Angeles, estimates about 4.1% of New Jersey residents are LGBTQ. The Williams Institute uses data from the Gallup Daily Tracking survey, as well as some Census data, to arrive at its estimates.
But the number or concentration of same-sex households doesn’t necessarily equate to a place being more or less LGBTQ-friendly. The Census data only lists four same-sex households in Maplewood Township, for example, but the town boasts a sizable LGBTQ population and made headlines a few years ago when it painted some of its crosswalks with rainbow colors. Maplewood also hosts a Pride festival each year and its deputy mayor, Dean Dafis, is also its first openly gay elected official.
Dafis is in a position to create programs and allocate funding to problems that affect LGBTQ people, but that’s difficult to do, he said, when he doesn’t know how many people need resources.
“Right now (data collection) is very ad hoc, and it’s frustrating for them and frustrating for me because I know I can’t do enough,” he said. “Even in communities like ours that are welcoming and inclusive … we are so behind the curve.”
Similarly, according to Census data, only 1.6% of all households in Asbury Park are same-sex but that city boasts a massive Pride parade each June that thousands attended last year. Asbury Park ranks 11th for both number (108) and concentration of same-sex households.
The incomplete data is a problem primarily because government agencies and nongovernmental organizations need accurate information to provide funding and services to LGBTQ people.
Elizabeth Schedl, the executive director of the Hudson Pride Center in Jersey City, said the undercounting makes it more difficult for advocates like her to provide services.
“We are primarily grant funded, and if the data isn’t there, they aren’t going to make the grants,” she said. “It’s like this circle that’s problematic.”
Schedl said she’s aware of a few efforts in Jersey City and elsewhere to encourage LGBTQ people to respond to the 2020 Census, and her organization is planning to apply for a grant to encourage people to respond via social media advertisements.
Velte has noted in her research that census researchers also have edited the responses of LGBTQ people. If a person marked their sex as “female” but their name appeared to be sufficiently “male,” census researchers would change the person’s sex to match their name. And in population counts prior to 2010, according to a series published by HuffPost, the Census Bureau would change the responses of same-sex couples who reported that they were married. The Bureau assumed the form had been mis-marked and changed one partner’s sex.
Data failings aside, advocates in New Jersey are attempting to provide programs and services to the state’s LGBTQ residents. Dafis, in Maplewood, has sought to add sexual orientation and gender identity self-identification options to municipal forms to start collecting data on his town. Rachel Paulus, the LGBTQ services librarian at the Newark Public Library, said the library’s LGBTQ Resource Center serves as both a community space for queer people and a way to learn about other services that are available to them.
“We look to be not only an information space, but a place where people can gather,” Paulus wrote in an email.
Despite the patchwork nature of programs and services for LGBTQ New Jerseyans, it’s essential that those spaces and services exist, said Stephanie Mills, the client service manager at the Hudson Pride Center.
“We know that LGBTQ people are everywhere,” she said. “It’s vital, it’s super vital to have these safe spaces.”
J. Dale Shoemaker is a reporter on the data & investigations team. He can be reached at jshoemaker@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter at @JDale_Shoemaker.