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Maine could expand demographic data collection under new bill

Policy advocates say Maine needs more demographic data to ensure state programs meet the needs of the people they're supposed to serve. They're backing a new bill from Assistant House Majority Leader Rachel Talbot Ross, D-Portland, to start the process.

Ross said she designed LD 1610 to strengthen the capacity of state agencies to collect, analyze and share information with the public. State agencies currently have a wide variety of data collection policies, but they usually don't focus on demographic information.

The bill is a companion to a law passed last year, which created a new program for including racial impact statements in the legislative process.

"If racial impact statements are going to fulfill their potential as a tool for policymakers, we need data to inform the analysis," Talbot Ross told the Legislature's state and local government committee Monday. "We need a fuller, more accurate picture of the people of Maine and their experiences."

Advocates for the bill say the data will give decision-makers a better picture of how Maine's population is changing over time. They say current data collection practices often paint underrepresented communities with a broad brush and fail to show how state policies impact smaller populations in Maine.

"One thing we have learned through that process for certain is in order for racial impact statements to give lawmakers a full picture of how proposed laws will impact racial groups, we need better data about populations in Maine today," said Morgan Pottle Urquhart, a communications manager for the Permanent Commission on the Status of Racial, Indigenous and Maine Tribal Populations.

Others who spoke at Monday's public hearing on the bill said Maine's small population underscores the importance of improving demographic data collection within the state. They said national studies from the Census Bureau, for example, fail to create a nuanced picture of what's truly going on with underrepresented communities within a small state like Maine.

Ross' bill would require that Maine draft a comprehensive data governance strategy and create two new demographic analyst positions within the state economist's office.