By Lynda L. Jones, Editor

This opportunity comes only once every decade, and if you don’t take ten minutes to answer these questions and mail it back in, you will not be counted. It is that simple. Our community, the Black community has a lot to gain or lose in the 2010 Census. We must make sure every person living here is counted.

The census questionnaire covers six topics and doesn’t take that much time to fill out. But the benefits last for 10 years. That’s a great investment. An investment in yourself, your own family and your community.

Every household is required by law to complete a census form to be counted. People who fill out and return their form by April 1 won’t be contacted by a census worker; the Census Bureau will try multiple times to get in touch with people who don’t complete the form.

Anyone with any questions about the form can get free help by calling a census hotline, which will be available in many languages, or getting information and assistance from local organizations working to get a complete count.

Census information has a huge impact on our communities: how we’re represented in local, state, and national government: how much money our communities get for schools, health care, and other services; where new money gets invested in transportation or roads; how effectively our educational and economic opportunities and civil rights are protected.

As Blacks in America we cannot afford to be undercounted, period. The Black population at large has already been deemed as part of a ‘hard-to-count’ population. And it was estimated that this population was undercounted by two percent in 2000, which amounted to a loss of $180 million in federal funds to Black communities in federal funds.

And now ten years later, the Black community has the chance to turn this around. Finally, something is in our hands, we control how we are counted. When you get the 2010 Census…Fill it out! And mail it in!

There is no need to fear the census, your privacy is protected. Census responses are completely confidential, protected by the strongest national privacy laws on the books. Any census worker or other government official who violates census confi dentiality can be imprisoned for up to five years and fined $250,000.

No other government agency-not even law enforcement or the courts-can get any person’s individual census information for the next 72 years.

No private company-no landlord, employer, bank, or creditor- can get any person’s individual census information, even with a court order.

Every census worker has to swear an oath to keep information confi dential for life, or they face big fines and jail time.

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