Dennis Deer (Photo: via Cook County Commissioner’s Office)
Dennis Deer has served as Cook County Commissioner in Chicago since July 13, 2017. As such, he proudly represents one of the most diverse districts in the county.
In 2020, Deer is working closely with the U.S. Census Bureau to ensure that every person in his district counted. Deer recently shared with rolling out why it’s imperative for everyone to participate in the 2020 census.
Why is it important for communities to participate in the U.S. census count?
I’ve been working on this very diligently. I am one of the vice chairs of the Complete Count Committee of Cook County. We’re particularly focusing on those hard-to-count populations. Every single person that gets counted for practical purposes is worth $1,400 to the federal government. Those who aren’t counted in that particular area lose $1,400.
What are the repercussions of not getting an accurate number of people in hard-to-count areas?
Those particular communities are losing money left and right. When we think about books for school, repairs to infrastructure and creating economic development, all of that is tied to finances. And so I oftentimes go out and talk about this in our respective communities. If the person isn’t counted, the federal government doesn’t see them. They are invisible, which means no resources will be dispatched in those areas. This is very critical that you make sure that every single person gets counted.
In 2010, one of the hardest-to-count populations was children under 5 years old. Those individually counted had instances where the adults in the house were counted and the kids were not. So we had lots of children who were not counted, and those children went invisible for the last 10 years. We also know that the census count is attached to our congressional representation. We know that taxation without representation just won’t work, and so we want to maintain good representation.
How can each person help to make sure the goals are reached?
We want to make sure that everyone is counted, so we have to spread the word. You have to make sure first that you are counted, and I’m challenging people to reach out to 10 individuals and make sure that they are counted and challenge them to reach out to 10 others individually. If we all challenge each other, every single person in the country will be counted.
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