Counting for the census ended last Thursday, but Tribes in Oklahoma and nationwide fear that the early end could lead to an undercounting of Native Americans.
After a contentious legal battle to extend counting to October 31st, the U.S. Supreme Court ordered an October 15th deadline.
Charles Tippeconnic is the Tribal Partnership Specialist for the U.S. Census Bureau and a citizen of the Comanche Nation. He worries an inaccurate count could shortchange Tribal citizens.
"Well, most importantly, it's being allocated the appropriate level of funding that each community deserves and needs for all our kids," Tippeconnic said. "All our health care, our public transportation, our schools, all of this funding that comes from federal agencies are based on data obtained from the census."
According to the National Congress of American Indian, Native Americans and Alaska Natives were undercounted by nearly five percent in the 2010 census.
As of October 14th, Oklahoma had a 61 percent self-response rate. That's six percentage points fewer than the national average and slightly less than the state's self-response rate in 2010.
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