The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights

Attending Community Events

Like other civic engagement campaigns, a census outreach campaign should reach people through a variety of community events and outlets.

The Census Partnership Program will have coordinated events throughout the country, including outreach at most major fairs and festivals. By partnering with the Census Bureau, you can take advantage of its outreach infrastructure to help get the word out in your community.

You can also help to make sure that the Bureau is taking advantage of every opportunity – their staff might not be aware of local or specialized events.

In fact, the Bureau has dedicated some resources for small grants to supply community-based organizations with materials for local events. In order to be eligible for such resources, your organization must be signed-up through the Census Partnership Program. Visit their website for more information and to sign up.

Tips

• Take advantage of school events. Consider reaching parents through back-to-school nights, parent-teacher associations and events. You can work with the Census Bureau's Census in the Schools program.
• Look at calendars of community events and decide which ones give you a good opportunity to reach people by having an information table, getting a spokesperson for your campaign to speak, or having volunteers distribute materials and answer questions.
• Think about all the community organizations and religious congregations that regularly produce newsletters, and work with the editors to get information on the census and/or an interview with a campaign spokesperson into as many as possible.
• Consider which community events might work as news stories for your media outreach.