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As someone who has worked over the last 5+ years with people of different age groups on working to get documents collected for IDs, there is a common theme that we run into with older members of the AA community: birth certificates are very hard to come by. https://twitter.com/danielmcfadin/status/1388260362546450436
There are a few factors and patterns that I have noticed over the years. Some people that are 80-90+ existed before the adaptation of the “modern” birth certificate. They are in possession of either a certificate of baptismal or the hospital birth certificate with footprints.
Neither of those documents are able to be used as proof of birth to get an id per the Real ID act of 2005. States have a deadline of later this year to be in full compliance, and there are still some struggling to get things for that reason.
Another thing is not knowing where you were born. It happens more than you think, especially in the black community. A child could have lived life in one state thinking it’s where they were born, but due to not having info on file, it can be a long and arduous process.
I’ve seen people on the verge of giving up because they’ve tried everything in the book but it never seems to be enough.
