Fort Wayne Census Committee
By: Marchelle McConnell
Updated: July 22, 2009
The committees goal is to come up with outreach strategies to get more people to fill out the ten question census that arrives next year.
Wednesday the Committee met for the first time. They are charged with the task of searching out the populations that are commonly missed in the count.
Mayor Tom Henry says “We have a huge group of immigrants and refugees that have become part of our community over the past several years. It’s probably one of the hardest groups to count.”
Each person on the council will be assigned a particular population that tends to be overlooked.
Mayor Henry says “They will be going to the shelter, the churches, the social service agencies to try to identify those who have historically fallen through the cracks.”
Dottie Carpenter run a homeless shelter called Ave Marie House. She says she would be more than willing to partner with the council. “I think the homeless need to be counted. They are part of Fort Wayne, they are citizens of Fort Wayne. They are human beings they need to be considered.”
The census is important because it determines the cities federal and state funding. Its estimated 47,000 Hoosiers were missed in the 2000 census.
The Mayor named today U.S. Census day in Fort Wayne.
