The U.S. Census sent out its American Community survey to select island homes this week. It's an important piece of the census puzzle — and a clear reminder that the big national count, Census 2010, is just around the corner.

But are we ready for the 10-year constitutionally-mandated count?

Not quite. After eight years of neglect under the Bush administration — during his tenure the agency went through three different directors, three deputy directors and three decennial count directors — there's much ground to make up, and fast.

So it's troubling to see such chaos over the census centered on Capitol Hill.

Robert Groves, an established survey researcher with the University of Michigan, was tapped in April by President Obama to be census director; he easily won approval of a Senate committee and scored high marks from experts in the field.

But one or more anonymous GOP senators have put a hold on his confirmation vote, saying they are not yet in agreement but offering no other explanation.

This hardly serves the public interest; further delays only jeopardize the accuracy of the count.

Meanwhile Minnesota's Republican Congresswoman Michele Bachman said she will boycott the census, expressing concerns about the left-leaning activist group Acorn, one of 40,000 participants in the bureau's partners program. Bachman said she is also concerned about the level of detail on the census forms, and the ability of the government to protect her privacy.

Wisely, her GOP colleagues Wednesday urged her to fill out her form properly: They reminded her that "boycotting the constitutionally-mandated census is illogical, illegal and not in the best interest of our country."

In a similarly wrongheaded move, some Latino leaders are urging undocumented immigrants to boycott the census, theorizing that the glaring absence of their huge numbers will underscore the need to push for immigration reform.

That misguided strategy has been rightly criticized by more sensible community leaders as "political suicide" and as working directly against any goal of immigration reform.

But there are bright spots amid the mess. About two months ago, the Bureau announced plans to use some of its $1 billion from the American recovery and Reinvestment Act to reach chronically undercounted communities.

And on Tuesday, U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gary Locke hired three well-respected experts to head off any potential problems with the 2010 count.

There's much at stake here. Census data determines how electoral maps are drawn and how many representatives each district will have.

State and local governments use detailed census data on income, household size, age and more, to make policy decisions.

The numbers also determine how federal dollars are doled out; census data helped determine Hawai'i's share of federal stimulus funds this year. That's a good reason for each of us to stand up and be counted.

Hawai'i and every other state in the nation have much riding on the 2010 census. Let's hope Congress wakes up in time to get the Census Bureau in shape to conduct a thorough and accurate national count.