Continuing resolution could impact census

September 27, 2007
By Elise Castelli

The continuing resolution (CR) expected to pass this week could throw off planning for the 2010 census, threatening its accuracy, a top Census Bureau official told House lawmakers Wednesday.

The House passed a CR Wednesday that would extend current spending levels across government through Nov. 16. The Senate is expected to take up the measure Sept. 28.

The President's 2008 budget request for Census's first six weeks of fiscal 2008 is double the funding set in the six-weeklong CR, said Preston Jay Waite, deputy director of the Census Bureau. The difference is great enough to mean the bureau will have to drastically alter the planning schedule for the 2010 census, Waite said.

The longer the bureau operates under a continuing resolution without additional funding for the census, the greater the risk the bureau will not be able fully test its data collection plans for the national headcount.

“If the CR goes to full term and there is no budget, at a minimum we will need to delay and down scope our dress rehearsal,” Waite said.

Census is introducing handheld devices in 2010 to automate the door-to-door data-collection process for its field agents. It is also introducing a new database to store information from the devices, paper surveys and telephone surveys.

Budget shortfalls mean the tests would be limited to just those two systems, he said. Scaling back testing, or not testing the systems at all, increases the risk that the census will not work perfectly or be accurate, Waite said.

If the budget shortfall extends beyond November, “we do not now have a plan for thinking about that kind of workload,” Waite said.

 

The Federal Times