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African immigrants make up the second largest foreign-born population in Prince George's County, but community leaders are worried that a pervasive mistrust of government — often stemming from experiences under repressive regimes in their native countries — could result in undercounting in next year's U.S. Census.

The U.S. Census Bureau estimated in 2008 that African immigrants made up about 26 percent of Prince George's immigrant population and about 4.7 percent of the total county population, under Hispanic immigrants, who make up about 54 percent of the county's immigrant population and about 10 percent of the total population.

The decennial count, which is set to begin in March, determines the flow of billions of dollars in federal and state funding for everything from schools and road repairs to health care. In an effort to make sure African immigrants are fully counted in 2010, the agency is teaming with local groups to combat the mistrust of government and overcome other cultural barriers unique to those communities.

"African communities have been undercounted [and] as a result they have not been able to receive the funding that is needed," said Morris Koffa, executive director of the Bowie-based Liberia Environmental Watch. "We are going to them and saying, ‘You don't have to be afraid, this is for your own advantage.'"

Koffa's organization usually directs its energy toward environmental preservation in Africa, but this year it is one of many groups throughout the D.C. metropolitan region using its ties to immigrant communities to promote the census.

Census Bureau partnership specialist Nesreen Khashan is based in Montgomery County but acts as one of the primary liaisons with African immigrant communities in Prince George's County. The agency's main strategy is to provide resources and information to local leaders whom the immigrants are more likely to trust, she said.

"When we get the leaders of their church and their clinics and ethnic organizations and local government officials saying we need to do this so we can serve you...we are on our way to overcoming those obstacles," Khashan said.

Another challenge is making the data collection forms accessible to immigrants who don't speak English.

Census forms are not available in most of the languages spoken by African immigrants, from French and Arabic to even less common languages, such as Swahili and Yoruba, said Chuks Eleonu, president of African Peoples Action Congress, a Centreville, Va.-based nonprofit organization that aids and unites African immigrant and refugee communities.

Eleonu's organization, like many others, will run centers throughout the region where African immigrants can have their forms translated.

Although Prince George's County has one of the highest concentrations of African immigrants in Maryland, outreach activities have tended to take place in either the District or Montgomery County because of proximity to larger facilities and the location of advocacy groups, according to Mariam Campbell, president of the Silver Spring-based Pan African Economic Development Project, a nonprofit organization that promotes economic development of Africans and their descendants.

Campbell said her organization has helped to organize more than a half-dozen events this year that brought together groups from throughout the metropolitan region to promote census participation.

"We don't have enough representation," Campbell said. "If we need to write a grant to have afterschool in our community, it is more unlikely for us to get it because what the county will have as our numbers. Our numbers are power."

E-mail Zoe Tillman at ztillman@gazette.net.