Ed Reed from Fair Count joins us to discuss their outreach and community infrastructure programs to increase awareness and participation in the 2020 Census.
Fair Count is a non-profit with a mission to engage hard to count communities in the US Census through outreach and education. They are also doing the groundwork the strengthen communities through civil engagement and providing infrastructure in communities that will be available for use long after the Census is complete.
- Programs: Field, Community, Faith, Technology, Black Men Count
- Importance of census: Over $1 Trillion dollars of Federal funding to states, cities and towns that are used to allocate funds for Education, Healthcare, Infrastructure
- Difficulty collecting accurate data: myths about participation in the census and providing info to the government, Citizenship concerns. Collecting data on homeless and transient population.
- Everyone breathing on April 1st should be counted on the census, no matter where you are living or staying.
- Confusion over apartment dwellers, group quarters such as assisted living facilities, university students: on-campus vs. off-campus housing
- Fair and accurate counts means for funding for political representation for these communities that are sometimes left out of the process.
- Get involved: Paid opportunities – https://www.faircount.org/careers/
- Get involved: Volunteer opportunities – https://www.faircount.org/commit-to-be-counted/
- Participate in the 2020 Census today: https://www.census.gov/
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