Writing a Letter to the Editor
One of the most widely read sections of any newspaper is the letters to the editor section. That means the letters page is a great way for your campaign to get its message out.
Most papers print short letters, so you're better off if you can get your message across in fewer than 200 words.
Letters are more likely to be printed if they are responding to an event or a story that ran in the paper. Keep an eye out for news stories on topics that are relevant to the census, and respond regularly.
- If there's a news story about people without access to health care, you can point out that federal and state health funds will be distributed to communities based on census figures.
- If there's a news story about school funding, or the poor condition of local roads, that gives you an opportunity to point out that funding for key services and infrastructure is based on population figures from the census.
You don't have to be complaining about coverage to get printed – you can use a letter to the editor to reinforce a good story and get its messages into the paper one more time.
Most papers don't want to run a lot of letters from the same person, so encourage different community leaders and advocates to write letters.
To the Editor:
The recent story on cuts to city services ("State budget cuts slam city coffers," January 10) makes it clear why the upcoming census is so important. Every resident who goes uncounted will cost the city thousands of dollars in federal and state funding every year for the next 10 years. If a thousand people go uncounted, we'll lose out on millions of dollars for schools, job training, health care or transportation. There are millions of reasons to fill out your census questionnaire when it comes in the mail this spring, and no good reason not to.
Joe Doe
To the Editor:
The story on family members sharing space during the economic downturn suggested that some people are worried about their landlords learning how many people are living together. The hard economic times make it even more important for everyone to be counted in the census; otherwise we'll lose out on funding for things like job training, housing assistance, and economic development. No landlord can get their hands on your confidential census information – neither can any government agency. The laws protecting the confidentiality of census information are so strong because it's so important to get the census right. Nobody should be afraid of the census. It's simple, it's safe, and it's important to all of us.
Julia Esquivel
