TORONTO - Devising fresh ways to paint Canada's national portrait after 340 years of census taking can tax even the most creative of minds. Still, Statistics Canada managed to mark at least two firsts with the 2006 census, the results of which begin to roll out Tuesday.
Jean Talon, the first Intendant of New France, no doubt wore out a pair of boots as he personally collected data from the colony's 3,215 inhabitants in 1666.
Fast forward to 2006 and the information superhighway, instead of a dirt road winding alongside the St. Lawrence River, was offered up for the first time as a means for Canadians to file their personal data.
Another debut was the option to keep one's personally identifiable information under wraps beyond the 92-year release period, a source of discontent for historians and genealogists who rely on such material to tell Canada's story.
On Tuesday, the first major release from last May's census will reveal not only how many of us there are in Canada, but also where and how we're living.
One trend Canadians can expect to see documented is the continued explosive growth of auto-dependent suburbs, despite poll after poll suggesting the environment is top of mind for Canadians.
The precision of census data allows analysts to pinpoint numerous cultural idiosyncrasies, including how many people commute to urban centres from any one community.
"The census is beautiful in a sense," said Anil Arora, director general of the census program branch at Statistics Canada. "It can go down to a very, very fine level of geography and tell you what's happening. . . nothing else comes to that degree of granularity or accuracy."
Those granules are scrutinized by all levels of government to make policy decisions, big and small.
Population counts dictate how some $62 billion is transferred from federal coffers to the provinces and territories. The numbers also determine where a community places that new bus stop.
And it's more than just government that pays attention.
Opening a shop in a community with lots of young families? You might want to stock the shelves with spill-proof cups and diaper wipes. Conversely, pharmacists surrounded by octogenarians might want lots of Bengay on hand.
"Those (decisions) are all based on census counts," said Arora.
The census is also a gold mine for historians and genealogists anxious to look beyond the faceless numbers and use everyday people to help tell Canada's story.
"It allows us to put a human face on our historical story, in a sense that we can actually look at these individuals and learn more about our past," said Bill Waiser, a history professor at the University of Saskatchewan. "These are the building blocks of Canadian history, census material."
While personally identifiable material becomes public 92 years after it's collected, the 2006 census allowed Canadians, for the first time, to keep the information collected last year from being released in 2098.
"Even if five per cent don't participate in it, this gem of historical treasure that we've had up to now will be compromised," said Waiser. "There will be people missing from (the Canadian) story and that's unfortunate."
Just how many Canadians said yes or no to releasing that information in 92 years will revealed on Tuesday.
"It will be very interesting to see what the results are," said Waiser. "Because of what happened in Western Canada with some of the controversy over the census collecting. It's going to be interesting whether that had an effect on this question."
The controversy stemmed from media reports that cited 67-year-old enumerator Sharon Newton as saying managers desperate to complete the census told data collectors to make up names for those people they couldn't contact.
"Maybe 10 (homes were done that way). . . it wasn't totally just bogus. I asked neighbours," Newton said when reached at her Chilliwack, B.C., home. "They were getting the population count but they didn't have the right names."
Newton said her real beef with Statistics Canada was with their payment system, which she said left her waiting months to receive full payment for her work.
Arora, who said the agency continues to look into Newton's complaint, concedes there were serious difficulties finding enough enumerators in Western Canada's "red hot" economy. The staffing issues saw Statistics Canada extend the collection period by about five weeks to "ensure that our data quality did not suffer."
"All of our indications are that data quality is as good as our censuses in the past. We know our strategy worked," said Arora.
The one in five households that submitted the census online cut some of the costs associated with traditional mail service, giving Statistics Canada the flexibility to add extra collection time without going over budget, Arora added.
The 2.26 million households that used the online service represent a "strong take up by Canadians," said Arora.
"That's more than double of any other country that's ever done that before."
Some 12.7 million households received census forms between May 1 and May 13 last year. Eighty per cent of respondents filled out the short, eight-question form. The long form contained 53 additional questions.
Results will be announced by Statistics Canada in a series of releases over the next 15 months.
