With the arrival of a new year and a new decade comes the official 2010 census to determine the population of the United States and every community in the nation.

In Wallowa County, as in other parts of the country, initial groundwork was done last spring, when a small corps of workers verified addresses and roads.

For the census itself, hundreds of thousands of workers will be hired nationwide between February and May.

“I don’t know how many people we’ll hire yet,” said Gary Ollerenshaw, Local Census Office manager. His office, located in Redmond, is responsible for conducting the census in 18 counties.

He said census operations will be done in phases, with the labor-intensive “update-leave” process – which means update the address and leave the census form – part of the process expected to begin March 1.

He estimated that roughly half of Oregonians will receive census forms in the mail and the other half will have them delivered by a census taker.

The census-taker job position has been listed with the Oregon Employment Department for several months throughout the region, including the Enterprise office.

There’s still time to apply for the temporary jobs, which will pay $12 an hour plus mileage.

According to Ollerenshaw, a basic skills test for the position will be administered at the Enterprise employment office at 9 a.m. and 1 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 5, and Thursday, Jan. 21. The tests will be limited to 20 applicants each.

Applicants will be asked to finish the 28-question test in 30 minutes. It will cover reading comprehension, basic math skills and map-reading skills. A sample test – which Ollerenshaw recommends – is at www.census.gov.

“The better score you get, the better your chances of being hired,” he said. “We give preference to veterans.” He said some applicants likely will be hired and in training by the end of January.

Some 20 to 30 Wallowa County residents are expected to be hired. The positions will last five to 10 weeks, posxsibly longer; final operations will end in October.