The Blitz - “All Out for the Count"

Friday evening, March 19 and Saturday evening, March 20, 2010 in
Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, San Jose, Seattle,
Anchorage, Juneau, Portland, Honolulu and more….

WHAT:         All Out for the Count is a first-ever U.S. Census Bureau outreach effort to educate and mobilize the LGBT population to fill out and mail back the Census form.  The purpose of this multi-city event is to engage people in their communities--in the bars, clubs, restaurants, coffee houses, bookstores and other businesses where they socialize on Friday and Saturday nights.  This will be a call to action, asking everyone to Mail It Back!

WHERE:        All Out for the Count will occur in multiple cities and venues on the West Coast—San Francisco, San Jose, Seattle, Anchorage, Juneau, Portland, Los Angeles, San Diego, Honolulu  and other communities.

WHEN:          The evenings of Friday and Saturday, March 19 and 20, 2010.

HOW AND WHY:
Organized by the 2010 Census LGBT outreach teams on the West Coast, and assisted by volunteers from organizations like Equality California and Equal Rights Washington, teams will cover LGBT neighborhoods, business and establishments distributing information and promotional items and engaging people in brief conversations about the 2010 Census.
Prior to the weekend, Census outreach teams will contact neighborhood businesses, providing them with census posters, stickers, coasters and T-shirts for their staff on those nights and creating partnerships with them to support the 2010 Census and encourage everyone to mail back their Census forms.

Households around the nation should have begun receiving the 10-question Census form in their mailboxes starting March 15.

Mandated by the U.S. Constitution, the census takes place on April 1, 2010. Census data determine boundaries for state and local legislative and congressional districts. More than $400 billion in federal funds are distributed annually based on census data to pay for local programs and services such as free lunches for low-income students, vocational training, road construction and emergency services.   

The 2010 Census form will be one of the shortest in U.S. history, consisting of 10 questions, taking about 10 minutes to complete. Strict confidentiality laws protect the respondents and the information they provide.

All Out for The Count is a far-reaching event that will be an important and historic effort in ensuring a complete count in the LGBT community on the 2010 Census.  For more information (in English and Spanish) about LGBT participation in the 2010 Census, please visit www.ourfamiliescount.org as well.  Other valuable information resources include:

www.2010census.gov 

www.law.ucla.edu/williamsinstitute