Members of the Grady Counts Committee offer to come to local businesses to help employees fill out Census

There are only three more weeks to make sure every Grady County resident is counted in the 2020 Census. The deadline to respond is Wednesday, Sept. 30.

“Census results shape the future of communities, as census data informs how billions of dollars in federal funds are distributed for health clinics, school lunch programs, disaster recovery initiatives, and other critical programs and services for the next 10 years,” according to information from the U.S. Census.

The top five states with more than 95 percent response rates are, Idaho, West Virginia, Washington, Hawaii and Kansas.

Georgia’s response rate was 60.8 percent as of Tuesday, and Grady County’s was 50.1 percent.

Grady Counts Committee, made up of volunteers working to insure the community is counted accurately, is working with local businesses and churches to make sure their employees and parishioners are counted.

“The Grady Counts Committee is helping businesses who are willing to let G.C.C. members come in to assist 12employees in registering during working hours,” explains Nola Daughtry, committee spokeswoman.

Business and church leaders are encouraged to contact committee members Courtney King at (229) 377-3663; Nola Daughtry at (229) 378-7272, or Alyssa Blakely at (229) 377-1722, ext. 185, to make arrangements for assistance from the committee.

Committee members are at Roddenbery Memorial Library’s Grady Room, 5 p.m. until 7 p.m. every Tuesday through Sept. 30, Daughtry says.

Roddenbery Memorial Library employees are helping the public fill out the census Monday through Thursday, 10 a.m. until 6 p.m., Fridays, 10 a.m. until 3 p.m., and in the Grady Room on Thursday evenings, 5 p.m. until 8 p.m.

The media center at Cairo High School is open every Tuesday, 5 p.m. until 8 p.m., with assistants on hand to help people if they have questions about the questionnaire.

In addition to answering the census online at  my2020census.gov or by mail, people may complete it by phone by calling 844-330-2020.

The Census Bureau’s Non-response Follow-up Operation is well underway and census takers are knocking on doors of households that haven’t responded yet to the 2020 Census. Census takers have been trained to follow public health guidelines including wearing a mask, conducting interviews outside and practicing social distancing.