The 2018 Legislative Session is in full swing. A myriad of bills are moving through the process, sometimes at a snail’s pace and other times faster than advocates can keep up. But before any of the bills got drafted, sometimes before the bills were even twinkles in a mind’s eye, there was data. The KIDS COUNT Project’s main premise is that in order to create good policy change for kids we must have good data.
One of the most used and easily accessed sources of data is the U. S. Census Bureau and one of the most familiar data source is the Decennial Census. People and organizations all over the country are already gearing up for the next decennial census in 2020. It’s a huge project and (at this point) underfunded. But there are a host of other data sources from the Census Bureau that provide data used by advocates, the media, policymakers, city planners, and grant writers. Throughout the year the Utah KIDS COUNT Project will be highlighting data sources from the Census Bureau with a series of Data Links that showcase the data from a variety of geographic levels, different databases, and topics. The first in the series, “A Tale of Four Cities,” features data on four major cities in Utah from the 2012-2016 American Community Survey.
Gathering and analyzing data is the first step in making informed policy decisions and ensures that the state makes smart changes for children and families. Watch for new Data Links every other month and get educated about the wealth of data available for you work on behalf of Utah’s kids.
To view Utah Kids Count Data Link: February 2018 click here.
