Every 10 years, the U.S. Census attempts to count every resident in the United States. This information is used to direct more than $400 billion in federal funds each year for things like: hospitals, schools, senior centers, bridges, and job training centers. The data collected by the census also help determine the number of seats your state has in the U.S. House of Representatives. It is a difficult process and historically resulted in certain communities not being fully counted. This “undercount” not only dilutes voting strength, it diminishes the flow of federal aid to states and localities. An accurate count will be especially important to Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and Texas, all of which stand to gain at least one Congressional seat and Electoral College vote after 2010, and Louisiana is bracing itself to lose one due to population declines after hurricane Katrina.
Count Me In
With so much at stake for communities across the country, the Pushback Network is engaged in Count Me In, a multi-state campaign to ensure that every resident of our nation has the opportunity to be counted, and that communities are not disadvantaged by virtue of being undercounted. . PBN allied organizations, with decades of successful advocacy and the respect of local individuals and institutions, are using our community capital to educate and organize our communities to GET COUNTED.
As a Network we seek to:
- Increase participation within hard to count populations and areas.
- Ensure the redistricting plans achieve an equitable apportionment of elected officials and a fair drawing of political districts.
- Use census-based outreach as a tool to recruit and develop new leadership in the local and state based work of our state alliances.
- Identify new long-term strategic partners locally and nationally.
Quick Facts
- Nearly two out of five of the “missing” residents from the 2000 census were in the South.
- Studies estimate that in 2000, every 1,000 people not counted lost over $26,000 for each state.
- Even in states that are relatively well counted by the census, certain portions of the state may have high undercount rates.
- Reports show that because of the undercount rate in to 2000, New york city lost $847 million in federal funding across the five boroughs.
- The 2000 census failed to count 1 million people of color.
Census Resources
Resource Organizations
For more information on Count Me In, please contact Jason Cooper, Program Director, at Jason@pushbacknetwork.org.
