Reversing course from a policy put in place under the Bush administration, same-sex couples will be counted as married in the upcoming 2010 census.

It was announced last summer that because the federal government could not legally recongnize same-sex marriages, same-sex couples would go uncounted. But last week, the new administration of President Barack Obama announced that DOMA did not prohibit information gathering, and thus, the couples would be included in the survey.

From the Associated Press:

One issue is that some same-sex couples in civil unions or domestic partnerships already identified themselves as husbands or wives, both in the 2000 census and in the annual American Community Survey that the bureau produces each year. So the bureau needs to figure out a way either to separate those couples from legally married couples in the next census, or to create a new designation to capture both groups. …

… Currently, if two people of the same gender in one household check “husband,” the data is rejected by the tabulation software for the American Community Survey and not included in the published information.

Since the last Census in 2000, Iowa, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, Maine and New Hampshire have legalized same-sex marriage.