Ditas M. Katague

Ditas M. Katague is the U.S. Census Bureau’s associate director for communications. She is responsible for leading the internal and external communications activities of the nation’s largest statistical agency. This includes oversight of marketing, public affairs, congressional and intergovernmental affairs, customer service, stakeholder engagement, and media relations.

Prior to joining the Census Bureau in 2022, Katague was director of the California Complete Count – Census 2020 Office, the outreach and communications campaign that worked to ensure a complete population count of historically undercounted Californians. This built on her experience leading the state’s decennial census outreach efforts in 2000 and 2010. In 2000, as chief deputy campaign director for the Governor’s Census 2000 California Complete Count campaign, Katague led a groundbreaking multilingual, multimedia outreach effort that resulted in a mail-in return rate that outpaced the national rate. She also served as chief of staff to the California Public Utilities Commission, where she improved public participation and access to the energy and telecommunications utility rate and regulation process.

Katague served on the Census Bureau’s National Advisory Committee on Racial, Ethnic and Other Populations, from 2012 to 2018, including three years as its chair.

Katague is an expert in multiethnic outreach and civic engagement. Since 1998, she has served on the Sacramento Center Advisory Board for the Sol Price School of Public Policy, University of Southern California. She holds a master’s degree in public administration from the University of Southern California and a bachelor’s degree from University of California, Berkeley.