Franklin County has agreed to buy a full page newspaper ad urging county residents to fill out their census and reminding them what it will cost the county if they don't.
Since January the Franklin County census committee has run almost 1200 radio ads, recorded 6 youtube videos, had a story every week in the Apalachicola Times, ran ads on Forgotten Coast TV, did a clickthrough banner ad for local websites, put out 1500 yard signs, and printed up thousands of flyers that have been distributed at food banks, covid-19 testing sites and other busy locations.
And after all of that only about 29 percent of Franklin County residents have filled out their forms.
Much of the problem is that for the first time this year the census is mostly on-line which means people without good internet access aren't filling out their forms.
The COVID-19 pandemic is also affecting the response rate.
But even so, Franklin County is still well behind much of the rest of the state and the nation in completing the census – the lowest completion rate is between Lanark Village and Alligator Point where only 17 percent of homes have completed the census.
The highest completion rate is in Apalachicola, North of Highway 98, where about 46 percent of homes have finished.
Not filling out the census will have a big impact on how much federal funding Franklin County gets over the next 10 years.
Each completed census is worth about 14,500 dollars a year for schools, fire departments, medicare reimbursements, early childhood and special education and other needed services.
This is money that we pay in taxes that will only be returned to us if the government knows how many people actually live here.
The one piece of good news is that the census completion date has been moved to October the 31st so there is time to get it done.
You can fill out your census now at http://www.my2020census.gov.
http://live.oysterradio.com/
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