<DOC>
[106th Congress House Hearings]
[From the U.S. Government Printing Office via GPO Access]
[DOCID: f:60286.wais]
OVERSIGHT OF THE 2000 CENSUS: EXAMINING THE BENEFITS OF POST-CENSUS
LOCAL REVIEW
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE CENSUS
of the
COMMITTEE ON
GOVERNMENT REFORM
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
FEBRUARY 11, 1999
__________
Serial No. 106-38
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Government Reform
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.house.gov/reform
______
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
60-286 CC WASHINGTON : 2000
COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM
DAN BURTON, Indiana, Chairman
BENJAMIN A. GILMAN, New York HENRY A. WAXMAN, California
CONSTANCE A. MORELLA, Maryland TOM LANTOS, California
CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut ROBERT E. WISE, Jr., West Virginia
ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida MAJOR R. OWENS, New York
JOHN M. McHUGH, New York EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York
STEPHEN HORN, California PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania
JOHN L. MICA, Florida GARY A. CONDIT, California
THOMAS M. DAVIS, Virginia PATSY T. MINK, Hawaii
DAVID M. McINTOSH, Indiana CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York
MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, Washington,
JOE SCARBOROUGH, Florida DC
STEVEN C. LaTOURETTE, Ohio CHAKA FATTAH, Pennsylvania
MARSHALL ``MARK'' SANFORD, South ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland
Carolina DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio
BOB BARR, Georgia ROD R. BLAGOJEVICH, Illinois
DAN MILLER, Florida DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois
ASA HUTCHINSON, Arkansas JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts
LEE TERRY, Nebraska JIM TURNER, Texas
JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois THOMAS H. ALLEN, Maine
GREG WALDEN, Oregon HAROLD E. FORD, Jr., Tennessee
DOUG OSE, California ------
PAUL RYAN, Wisconsin BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont
JOHN T. DOOLITTLE, California (Independent)
HELEN CHENOWETH, Idaho
Kevin Binger, Staff Director
Daniel R. Moll, Deputy Staff Director
David A. Kass, Deputy Counsel and Parliamentarian
Carla J. Martin, Chief Clerk
Phil Schiliro, Minority Staff Director
------
Subcommittee on the Census
DAN MILLER, Florida, Chairman
JOHN T. DOOLITTLE, California CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York
THOMAS M. DAVIS, Virginia DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois
PAUL RYAN, Wisconsin HAROLD E. FORD, Jr., Tennessee
MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana
Ex Officio
DAN BURTON, Indiana HENRY A. WAXMAN, California
Thomas B. Hofeller, Staff Director
Erin Scanlon, Professional Staff Member
Mark Stephenson, Minority Professional Staff Member
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Hearing held on February 11, 1999................................ 1
Statement of:
Boatwright, Lanier, president, National Association of
Developmental Organizations; and Barbara Welty, board
member, National Association of Towns and Townships........ 88
Bourey, James, executive director, Maricopa Association of
Governments; Kenneth Blackwell, Secretary of State's
Office; Timothy M. Kaine, mayor, city of Richmond; and
Carol A. Roberts, county commissioner, Palm Beach County,
FL......................................................... 48
Ehrlich, Everett, U.S. Census Monitoring Board; and Barbara
Bryant, National Quality Research Center, School of
Business Administration, University of Michigan............ 113
Foley, Hon. Mark, a Representative in Congress from the State
of Florida................................................. 47
Petri, Hon. Thomas, a Representative in Congress from the
State of Wisconsin......................................... 27
Sawyer, Hon. Thomas, a Representative in Congress from the
State of Ohio.............................................. 28
Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by:
Blackwell, Kenneth, Secretary of State's Office, prepared
statement of............................................... 61
Boatwright, Lanier, president, National Association of
Developmental Organizations, prepared statement of......... 91
Bourey, James, executive director, Maricopa Association of
Governments, prepared statement of......................... 50
Bryant, Barbara, National Quality Research Center, School of
Business Administration, University of Michigan, prepared
statement of............................................... 122
Davis, Hon. Danny K., a Representative in Congress from the
State of Illinois:
Letter dated February 9, 1999............................ 110
Prepared statement of.................................... 21
Ehrlich, Everett, U.S. Census Monitoring Board, prepared
statement of............................................... 115
Kaine, Timothy M., mayor, city of Richmond, prepared
statement of............................................... 66
Roberts, Carol A., county commissioner, Palm Beach County,
FL, prepared statement of.................................. 74
Sawyer, Hon. Thomas, a Representative in Congress from the
State of Ohio, prepared statement of....................... 31
Waxman, Hon. Henry A., a Representative in Congress from the
State of California, prepared statement of................. 6
Welty, Barbara, board member, National Association of Towns
and Townships, prepared statement of....................... 98
OVERSIGHT OF THE 2000 CENSUS: EXAMINING THE BENEFITS OF POST-CENSUS
LOCAL REVIEW
----------
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 11, 1999
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on the Census,
Committee of Government Reform,
Washington, DC.
The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 11:15 a.m., in
room 2247, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Dan Miller
(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Present: Representatives Miller, Doolittle, Ryan, Souder,
Waxman, Davis of Illinois, and Ford.
Staff present: Thomas W. Brierton, deputy staff director;
Jennifer Safavian, chief counsel; Timothy Maney, chief
investigator; Erin Scanlon, professional staff member; Phil
Schiliro, minority staff director; Michelle Ash, minority
counsel; Mark Stephenson, minority professional staff member;
and Earley Green, minority staff assistant.
Mr. Miller. Good morning. I apologize once again for the
delay in the beginning of this hearing on the census. This is a
very important hearing and I appreciate everybody's patience.
I just found out late last night about the Congressional
Black Caucus having a conference concerning the census this
morning. I was invited over there at 10 o'clock, and I
appreciate that opportunity. I felt that it was important
enough, as they had a very distinguished panel over there, to
be able to participate in it. So I, once again, express my
apology.
We'll begin with my opening statement, and an opening
statement by the minority. Mr. Davis will be giving that, and
then we'll go to our first panel.
Let me say good morning and welcome to everyone and welcome
to the new members. They're not here right now, but we have a
lot of new members. We have one new member on the minority side
and we have three new members on the majority side. Hopefully,
they'll be here sometime during the hearing.
This is my second term as chairman, and I'm excited about
working together with everyone to achieve a successful census
in 2000. Unfortunately, our ranking member, Mrs. Maloney, was
unable to join us today. She's overseas traveling on official
government business. I know if it were at all possible, she
would be here. Under normal circumstances, I would have
postponed the hearing and markup scheduled for later today. But
these are anything but normal circumstances. They are
extraordinary circumstances.
Just weeks ago, the Supreme Court ruled the Census Bureau
cannot use sampling in the 2000 census. Now, we must move
quickly to provide the Bureau and local governments the tools
they need to count everyone in America.
Any legislation that Congress intends to pass that would
have the Census Bureau adopt a program such as post-census
local review must be done expeditiously. To delay this hearing
would delay the subcommittee markup. To delay the subcommittee
markup would delay the full committee markup, as well as final
action on the House floor. I haven't even talked about getting
this legislation through the Senate.
I would also add that, as everyone in this room
understands, this is a long process and there will be ample
opportunities for people on both sides of this issue to voice
their views, offer amendments, and cast their votes.
To be fair to the Census Bureau, we must provide them
needed time to implement any new program that Congress may
legislate. It's unfortunate that Mrs. Maloney is traveling
abroad, however, the business of counting America cannot be
delayed.
So, we are here to take another important step in counting
America. The ``America Counts Today'' initiative is a
progressive plan to count everyone in the 2000 census without
the use of illegal sampling. This plan, supported by the
leadership, contains a number of different proposals: hiring
100,000 additional census enumerators who would target the
hardest-to-count communities; increasing the advertising budget
for the Census Bureau; conducting a second mailing of census
forms; providing matching grants for local communities to
conduct community outreach programs.
Yesterday, Congresswoman Carrie Meek, a distinguished
member of the Congressional Black Caucus, and I jointly
introduced legislation that would allow welfare recipients and
veterans to take temporary census jobs without losing their
benefits. Mrs. Meek is to be commended for her efforts in this
area and her commitment to working with Republicans to get the
most accurate count possible. She is setting a shining example
of cooperation.
Today, we are here to focus on another key element of the
``America Counts Today'' initiative: post-census local review.
Post-census local review is a very straightforward, common-
sense idea implemented by the Bureau in 1990. When explaining
the importance of post-census local review in 1990, the Bureau
said,
Most important is that local officials have an opportunity
to review the math and count while the census is still in
progress. Possible errors identified and reported at this stage
are relatively easy to check and correct if necessary. Once
this stage is passed, problems can become difficult to resolve.
The officials of local and tribal governments that choose
to participate also will have a better understanding of the
procedures and concepts involved in taking a census. A
considerable amount of good will and understanding of one
another can develop between the governmental unit, the State
agencies assisting the governmental unit and Census Bureau
personnel as a result of the interaction during the local
review program.
Apparently, the Bureau now feels that these good reasons
for having post-census local review in 1990 are no longer
valid. They are discontinued--they have discontinued this
important step in the census process and this is unfortunate
and it must be corrected.
I know there are two words that local officials hate to
hear from the Federal Government. They are: ``Trust us.''
That's exactly what the Bureau's telling local governments. On
the one hand, they tell us how important the census is and how
important it is to get everyone counted and on the other hand
they are saying ``We don't want you to check our work. It's
accurate. Trust us.''
Well, that type of attitude does not breed confidence in
the census. It breeds distrust in the census. While it's true
that the Bureau has worked very closely in building good
address lists and maps through the ``Local Update of Census
Address Program,'' commonly known as LUCA, it just doesn't make
sense to eliminate the local involvement on the back end. After
all, the finalization of the numbers is critically important.
I don't know where my Democratic colleagues here today
stand on this issue. I know some here don't believe it would be
helpful. But I would urge anyone speaking in opposition to a
local audit not to try and convince me that it's a bad idea.
You need to convince the California League of Cities, which
represents 472 California cities, why the post-census local
review is a bad idea.
Convince the National League of Cities that a post-census
local review is a bad idea. Convince the National Association
of Towns and Townships. Convince Mayor Dennis Archer of Detroit
who spoke very forcefully at the U.S. Conference of Mayors in
favor of post-census local review. Tell him why adding 47,000
residents to the city of Detroit, as they did in 1990, is a bad
idea.
And most importantly, explain to your local government
leaders why they should blindly put their fate in the hands of
the Federal Government and not review those census numbers that
we all agree are so vital before they become final.
I'm amazed that there's anyone at all testifying against
this legislation, but there are. What's even more astonishing
is the reasons why. Cost effectiveness--the assistant city
attorney for the city of Los Angeles will tell us later,
according to her testimony, ``This time-consuming, costly
process was to add a mere 7,735 dwelling units to the city's
housing unit PAL.''
So now we have the sampling advocates on the record as not
wanting to go the extra mile to get their citizens counted. How
ironic. A ``mere 7,735 units'' is what her testimony says. If I
were ever to make those comments, I would be branded as not
wanting to count everyone. How many minorities and children
live in those 7,735 housing units? And why shouldn't they be
counted?
What these opponents of post-census local review are now
saying is that everyone is not worth counting. It's not worth
the additional effort and time and cost to ensure that everyone
is counted. Well, I can tell you now that if I have anything to
say about it, this Congress will go the extra mile to ensure
that everyone is counted. We have a constitutional duty to do
nothing less.
In conclusion, let me make something perfectly clear. We've
fought the fight over sampling in the Supreme Court and we won.
But that's not good enough. As the saying goes, if you're going
to talk the talk, you need to walk the walk. We need to put
forth concrete proposals that will help give the Bureau and
local communities the resources they need to get an accurate
count.
Post-census local review is not the silver bullet to a full
count in the 2000 census. It is one important piece of a multi-
faceted effort to count everyone. As I said 2 weeks ago when I
introduced the ``America Counts Today'' initiative, I am
looking forward to getting a Census Bureau plan for a full
enumeration. It is overdue. I also look forward to innovative
proposals from the administration on how they intend to count
America legally.
This isn't about taking credit or casting blame. Yesterday,
Congresswoman Meek and I stood shoulder-to-shoulder and
introduced an important tool in helping get America counted.
That needs to be the example that we need to continue to
follow. We must stop using the census to divide America. We
must unite and count America.
And now, we'll have an opening statement by the minority.
Any other members that want to have an opening statement, we'll
submit it for the record.
Mr. Waxman. Well, Mr. Chairman, I would hope you'd allow
members to make their opening statements. We didn't object to
you going on beyond the 5-minutes and I don't think our side
will use more time than you did. But ordinarily members should
have that courtesy extended to them.
Speaking of courtesy being extended to us, I'm here to
express some bewilderment and regret as to the state of
affairs. The ranking member of the subcommittee, Mrs. Maloney,
presumably had a conversation with you asking that this meeting
not be held in her absence because she's leading the U.S.
delegation at the International Conference on Population and
Development. Representatives Davis and Ford had to cancel
previous commitments at the Congressional Black Caucus Summit
in order to be here.
Our committee has a bill on the floor at the very same
time, coincidentally, not something you would have been able to
anticipate. So, it's one thing to have the situation where the
ranking member requests and presumably was granted your promise
not to hold the hearing, however we also find ourselves with a
hearing and a markup scheduled immediately after the hearing.
Ordinarily, to find out whether a bill is a good idea or
not, and I don't prejudge the matter, because I'd like to hear
what the witnesses have to say, you hear from the witnesses,
you evaluate their testimony, oftentimes you get ideas from
other people and don't just tell them what you think. You want
to hear what they have to say and get some input. And based on
the input, we might well have some further thoughts about what
the legislation ought to say. But today, it doesn't appear
we're going to have any opportunity to take the testimony into
account if it suggests needs for changes in this legislation
before the subcommittee's proceeding to a markup.
This doesn't suggest to me a desire to hear and accommodate
minority concerns, Democratic party concerns, your colleagues'
concerns on this side of the aisle. Ironically, the subject of
this legislation is one that could produce fruitful bipartisan
legislation. Each of us here knows and works closely with local
governments in our district. We often share their concerns.
Consequently, when a group of local government officials comes
before us with a problem, we usually work to find a bipartisan
solution to their concerns.
Today, we'll hear that local governments want to make sure
that the census counts all of the housing units in their
jurisdiction. I'm sure that all of us here today agree with
that goal. It is possible, though highly unlikely, that the
bill to be marked up this afternoon is the single and unique
solution to the set of problems.
In fact, the city of Los Angeles yesterday adopted a motion
opposing H.R. 472; so obviously, all local governments are not
in agreement as to how to achieve the goal of an accurate
account. And I would like to submit that motion into the
record, along with my statement. In addition, I'd like the
testimony of Jessica Heinz, the assistant city attorney for the
city of L.A., to be submitted into the record. Ms. Hines was
unable to be with us today.
[The prepared statement of Hon. Henry A. Waxman and the
information referred to follow:]
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Mr. Waxman. I believe there are a number of ways we could
solve the problems raised by local governments in an open and
unprejudiced manner. If we had a discussion of these
possibilities, it might lead to a solution that all of us could
stand behind. Unfortunately, the subcommittee has precluded the
possibility of rushing to a markup immediately after this
hearing. And then, I don't know what the schedule was like
today, but this was a hearing scheduled for 10 o'clock. I was
prepared to be here at 10. I was informed the meeting was going
to be put off. I got all of one--maybe 5 minutes notice that
the meeting was already called to order. So I rushed from the
floor and I have to rush back to the floor because we have a
bill under consideration.
I want to thank all the witnesses that are going to be
testifying today. I regret that I won't be here, but I'll have
an opportunity to review your testimony. The chairman made a
misstatement. I just have to respond to it. The Supreme Court
did not settle the issue about sampling to get an accurate
account. The court said you cannot use, by a narrow margin of
5-4, sampling in the census for the purpose of apportioning
seats between the States. But the court was very clear in
affirming that the law requires the Secretary of Commerce to
use sampling where feasible for all other purposes. And that
would seem to me to lead us to the situation where we're going
to have two counts, two counts that will be submitted--one that
will not be fully accurate in terms of apportionment between
the States and another one for all other purposes that will be
far more accurate. Perhaps we can change it and have one count
that will be the most accurate count for all purposes. But I
sense that that's not something that the majority is going to
be receptive to because they want the least accurate count to
be the one to apply for all purposes.
Mr. Chairman, I'm not going to be here for the witnesses. I
don't think it really makes sense or is appropriate to rush to
a markup. For myself, I'm just not going to be here for your
markup. I don't know what other members are going to do. I
don't see why we ought to even be participating in the markup
the way we find ourselves today. If you go forward, you go
forward. And I'll just deal with these issues as we get to full
committee, still with the hope that we can talk and work
together and try to get a bipartisan bill. If not, we'll fight
the fights out in full committee. I'm not going to be here to
fight in its subcommittee and I don't know what my colleagues
are going to do but I don't know why they'd want to stick
around, either.
So I yield back my time. I hope you'll let other members
who want to make opening statements have that opportunity.
Mr. Miller. Thank you, Mr. Waxman. One of the reasons it
was delayed is that I was invited to go participate in the
Congressional Black Caucus over at the Hyatt and I went over
and participated in the panel. I felt it was worthwhile enough
to delay the hearing for an hour.
Traditionally, as you know, we don't normally have all the
members. Mr. Sawyer and Mr. Petri are going to be our opening
panel. We have two new members, Mr. Ford and Mr. Ryan, and if
they want to make opening statements, we'll do that. I hope it
doesn't mess up everybody's schedule too much. It won't take,
hopefully, too long. Is that alright? OK?
Well, let me call on Mr. Ryan for an opening statement.
Mr. Ryan. Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. First, let me start
off by saying that we do want an accurate census. That's very
important for us. The importance of a census to our system of
government cannot be stressed enough. That is what all of us
are after. It was specifically provided for in our
Constitution. The founders of our country clearly felt that it
was vital to ensure fair representation for the citizens of
this country. Getting an accurate census count in the year 2000
will be of the utmost importance to the citizens of my home
State of Wisconsin, which is why I'm very pleased to have a
member of our delegation, Congressman Petri, here before us
today. He knows this census process very, very well. He's been
involved in it for a number of years. And he will be testifying
with us today.
Congressman Petri played a key role in the 1990 census and
I believe his input in planning the year 2000 census will be
invaluable. So I hope members will stick around to hear his
testimony.
It is the goal of this subcommittee to have an accurate
census in the year 2000, as I mentioned, and the involvement of
local governments is essential to the accuracy of our census. I
am concerned, however, though, that efforts to make the
upcoming census accurate are in question. Yesterday, we heard
from the GAO with our high risk series in the full committee
level. The GAO has labeled the 2000 census a ``high risk''
program based on information that the Census Bureau has not yet
developed.
Now, the Supreme Court ruling that an actual enumeration is
legally necessary in the census process requires the Census
Bureau to shift its focus toward counting citizens rather than
sampling. So, the question is, how are they going to get ready
and work on enumeration?
The administration and the Census Bureau have chosen to
disregard the Supreme Court's decision. That is very
unfortunate. It is vital to the success of the Census Bureau to
concentrate all of its efforts on one method of data collection
to avoid any confusion and inefficiency.
It's already, you know, February 11th. We're less than 2
years away. According to the GAO, the state of the plan for the
2000 census is at risk for a number of reasons, not the least
of which is a desire by the Census Bureau to pursue two methods
of data collection or focus on obtaining two sets of numbers.
Sampling is not an option, according to the Supreme Court. Our
Constitution requires actual enumeration. The Supreme Court did
specifically say that we must engage in enumeration for
apportionment reasons. We are behind the eight ball right now.
It is time to turn our attention to a method that will
actually help us achieve these goals. It is well within the
ability of the Census Bureau to obtain more accurate numbers
through a program focused on actual enumeration. A program
focused on outreach and local government review will give us
the accuracy we are looking for.
The bill proposed by the chairman of this committee lays
out that kind of foundation for a successful census through
actual enumeration. This voluntary program, allowing the input
of local governments serves as a check on that data. Local
government officials know their jurisdiction, they know their
areas, much better than any Washington bureaucrat does. So they
are in the best position to point out the flaws in district
maps or neighborhoods that are being undercounted. This would
ensure that all people in their area are accounted for.
In 1990, when we did do this, it worked. And the Census
Bureau utilized post-census local review. Approximately 16.3
percent of the eligible government units participated. It was
very successful for the areas that chose to participate. Over
91,000 additional housing units were added. Participant cities,
such as St. Louis, Milwaukee, in my home State, and Detroit
were able to achieve a more accurate count for their
populations through the use of post-census local review.
Local governments know how important an actual census
number is to their representation. The local governments do not
need an incentive program to increase their desire to have
everyone counted. They just need the tools to make sure that it
happens. That is the key in this bill and I think that's a very
important part of this legislation that we're going to be
marking up.
Now, the Census Bureau can do that by working with them to
focus on areas that are typically undercounted. No one in this
room wants a failed census. Your politics aside, we must do
everything possible to ensure that the census is on the right
track.
I would like to thank all of the witnesses for coming to
the committee today and I look forward to their testimony.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Miller. Thank you. Mr. Davis.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. Yes. Thank you very much, Mr.
Chairman. And I also want to thank Mr. Waxman, the ranking
member, for coming over to express his concerns.
Mr. Chairman, I agree that this is a long, important, and
sensitive process and I appreciate your desire to move as
expeditiously and as prudently as possible. But I must admit
that I'm a bit concerned that you've decided to call this
hearing today in the absence of our ranking member, Mrs.
Maloney. The issue of the census and accuracy is too important
to exclude major people who need to be at the table.
As we began the 106th Congress, the Republican leadership
did so with the pledge of bipartisan cooperation. However, this
hearing and the markup that is scheduled to follow do not
strike a bipartisan note.
This issue of post-census local review is an important
issue. However, this is not a new issue. As a matter of fact,
it is an old issue with a troubled past. Thus, I look forward
to hearing Dr. Bryant's comments on how this post-census local
review worked in 1990.
As a former city councilman and a Cook County commissioner,
I can really appreciate the presence of local governmental
officials who are here today. Because this is really about
resource allocation. And those who can get an accurate count
can maximize their potential for Federal resources.
Consequently, those in urban cities and rural communities
who are missed lose out because they really do not count. So
the 100 million people--the 10 million people who were missed
in 1990, many of them poor, were essentially told that you do
not count. Their local governments were short-changed of
valuable resources. In Chicago, the undercount was roughly 2.4
percent. And the African-American undercount was significantly
higher, at between 5 and 6 percent.
After examining the issue of post-census local review, I am
not convinced that this gets us to the ultimate objective of a
fair and accurate census for America. Because this post-census
local review looked at housing units on a block by block basis,
I submit that instead of relying upon the counting of housing
units, let's count all of the people. In fact, the number of
localities participating in the post-census local review was
minimal.
In addition, I am concerned that the costs borne by local
communities will be very high. Also, I am concerned about
accuracy because in 1990 about 12 percent of the 124,900 added
to the census count were added erroneously. Nonetheless, I look
forward to hearing from our expert witnesses and again,
especially Dr. Bryant, who has devoted several pages to this
issue in her book.
I believe that the legislation, H.R. 472, the Local Census
Quality Check Act, which is scheduled for markup, is both
unwarranted and dangerous. First, it is too soon to tell if the
Address List Correction Act, which was passed in 1994, will
lead to greater accuracy and address some of the concerns at
the local level. Moreover, this legislation could hamper and
burden the Census Bureau as they attempt to implement a model
that works.
Finally, I believe that the legislation duplicates many of
the activities already carried out in doing the pre-census
local preview. I look forward to hearing from our experts how
much of a burden this legislation will place on local
governments. In addition, I look forward to hearing whether
this legislation is really needed.
Again, I thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I have in my hand a
letter that was written to you and to Mrs. Maloney from Mr.
Prewitt who is Director of the Bureau of Census. I'd like to
read into the record this letter if I might:
Dear Dan and Carolyn, I understand that the Subcommittee on
the Census is holding a hearing tomorrow on H.R. 472 which
would add a new section, 143, to Title 13 and require a post-
census local review, PCLR. I also understand that the
subcommittee intends to mark up the bill immediately after the
conclusion of the hearing.
While I appreciate and understand the subcommittee's great
interest in census operations, I am profoundly disappointed
that the majority has apparently opted to pursue a legislative
route to impose its judgments over the operational design
judgments of the career professionals at the Census Bureau. In
fact, the majority did not invite the Census Bureau to testify
on this issue.
On January 14, 1999, the Census Bureau submitted to
Congress a report, ``Census 2000: Operation Plan,'' using
traditional census-taking methods. The covering memo for the
report noted that the career professionals at the Bureau have
judged PCLR to be an ineffective way of improving census
coverage.
This judgment reflects their experience with PCLR in the
1990 Census, which proved to be very expensive in both time and
cost and provided very little improvement in accuracy. In fact,
the operation only added 124,900 persons to the count, which is
less than a 2-percent reduction of the gross undercount of
roughly 8.5 million persons.
It also included high error rates and extremely high cost
per case. As the Census Bureau and outside experts have
recognized and advised Congress, the benefits of PCLR derived
from local governments' information on addresses in that
jurisdiction, particularly new construction. Such information
can and should be used in the census, but much earlier in the
process than would occur on the PCLR. In our best judgment, the
PCLR operation proposed in H.R. 472 would engage local
governments in the wrong way and at the wrong time, as did the
1990 operation.
The Bureau continues to refine its operational plan in
light of both the recent Supreme Court ruling and lessons from
the 1998 dress rehearsals, including active consideration of
new procedures to include in Census 2000 all new construction
through March 2000. In that context, the Census Bureau is
working on better methods for drawing on the expertise and
information of local governments and to accomplish the benefits
contemplated by PCLR.
I would strongly urge the subcommittee to take no
legislative action before granting us the opportunity to
explain our concerns and plans. Sincerely, Kenneth Prewitt,
Director.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman,
and that concludes my opening remarks.
[The prepared statement of Hon. Danny K. Davis follows:]
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Mr. Miller. Mr. Ford.
Mr. Ford. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I won't be long. I, too,
am a little disturbed. You and I are friends. At least, I
consider us friends. I know you don't normally operate this
way. It concerns me a little bit that in light of this
committee's history--a very interesting partisan history we
have on the full committee--that we would start the year out on
this note, start this session off on this note, particularly
when there's ample time to have at least waited for Mrs.
Maloney to have returned. It's not as if she's on vacation.
She's leading a U.S. delegation at an international women's
conference.
I think, compounding the fact I believe I'm still the
youngest Member of Congress. Paul Ryan has about 4 months, I
think, on your side. He made excellent and compelling points in
his opening remarks and I am not one, Mr. Chairman, who has
made up my mind on this issue at all.
But I would say to the chairman and to my friend, Mr. Ryan,
whose family I met, I think, when they were out to dinner when
he first got to Washington, that this is not the way we ought
to go about doing this. Mr. Prewitt, who's the director? I know
I see Steven Holmes has come into the room, the writer with the
New York Times, his article this morning which I hope the
chairman would allow me to introduce into the record, clearly
states that the Director of Census would have loved to have
been invited, to have at least had an opportunity to answer
what I think are some pretty relevant questions.
I know that Mr. Waxman offered a piece of evidence that
suggests that maybe the city of Los Angeles is not in lock-step
with some of the California cities or local governments that
would support your bill, Mr. Miller. But at least allow them to
respond as to why they believe that this post-census local
review is not cost-effective. If, indeed, it is cost effective
and will allow us to have an accurate count, then it's
something that I would be willing to support. It's just at this
point it doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
I think all of us support fairness. An accurate count would
certainly constitute fairness. But anytime that we can--
particularly with this committee, Mr. Chairman, figure out ways
to infuse at least a perception of fairness, I think we ought
to be in the business of doing that. I think that all of us in
the committee--and I do not excuse those on my side for helping
to diminish some of the credibility of this committee over the
last 2 years--but anytime that we can take steps to try to
correct that and repair the image, I think we ought to.
I thank you for responding kindly to Mr. Davis' and my
letter to come over to the Congressional Black Caucus Summit
and provide some words or provide some guidance as to what the
committee might be doing. But I do think we also have a
responsibility to the Census Bureau itself to allow Director
Prewitt--I'd love to hear him explain why is it that he doesn't
support the legislation that you're offering, Mr. Chairman. I
don't question the merits of your legislation because we are in
opposite parties. You're a good man and I'm certain that you
want a fair count and an accurate count.
But, it certainly raises suspicions on my side and doesn't
do anything to foster the type of camaraderie--not to suggest
that we ought to be agreeing on everything, but at least be
agreeable in our disagreements. And this--starting off this way
doesn't do anything to add to that. It doesn't enrich, nor does
it do anything to correct or repair or rehabilitate the
battered image of this committee.
Again, I don't blame you guys solely for that. We certainly
played a part in that, as well. And I hope my colleagues, Mr.
Sawyer and Mr. Petri, do not take offense but I'm going to
follow the lead of my ranking member on the committee, Mr.
Waxman, and just simply refuse to participate on the grounds of
process.
As a new member and a second-term member, I hope that we
can all begin to work together and work together in better
ways. Again, I don't expect you guys to agree with us or agree
with me on everything, but at least let's agree on a fair and
accurate process, much like the fair and accurate count, Mr.
Chairman, that your bill seeks to make a reality.
As I close, I find it somewhat interesting in your letter,
Mr. Chairman, that you talk about--and again, I don't think
there is any animus on your part to hold this hearing without
Mrs. Maloney but I do think it raises legitimate suspicions on
my side. As you mention in your letter, as we juggle these busy
schedules, as a member of six congressional subcommittees.
One of the issues we have in this Congress between Democrat
and Republicans, an internal issue, is committee ratios. And
with a six-vote margin between the two parties, the guys on my
side of the aisle who are lucky to serve on one committee and
have just one subcommittee. God bless you for having all those
subcommittees.
You clearly possess all it takes to do those things, but to
serve on Appropriations, chair this subcommittee and the
Committee on Budget--as a member who had one committee for 8
months his first term in the Congress, you're a good man. I
hope that one day I have the opportunity to have all of these
responsibilities but I do hope that we, as we seek an accurate
and fair count of the general public, that we also look at an
accurate and fair count in this Congress and try to make sure
that, to the extent that we can get along a lot better and work
better together, that we do that.
Again, I apologize to Mr. Petri and Mr. Sawyer and hope
that you get a chance to come back before the committee and I
hope that we have an opportunity to invite Director Prewitt
because I, too, want to hear, Mr. Chairman, why is it that he
doesn't support this bill and why he thinks these are efforts
to micro-manage preparations for the 2000 census. He's made
some legitimate complaints and I think he ought to have the
opportunity to answer those questions.
I apologize to my good friend and new colleague, Mr. Ryan,
for having to start out this way. And to you, as well, Mr.
Chairman, but I just won't participate. I hope my colleague,
Mr. Davis, although he certainly has the right to start when he
wants to, chooses not to participate either. And again, I thank
you for the opportunity to have an opening remark.
Mr. Ryan. If I could, Mr. Chairman, may I ask a quick
question? Were all of the witnesses that were requested by the
minority approved?
Mr. Miller. Yes. The minority asked for four witnesses and
they were granted every witness they wanted. I thought that
they might be asking for Mr. Prewitt to be here.
Mr. Ford. Unfortunately, I'm the least senior guy here on
the committee, so I apologize for not having more influence in
this process. But I'd say to my friend, Mr. Ryan, I've only
been here 2 years, but it seems to me it would be logical to
invite the director of the organization. The Census would
implement this plan. You're not that new----
Mr. Ryan. I'm even newer.
Mr. Miller. We need to move forward because there are a lot
of witnesses and I'm disappointed that you're not going to be
able to stay and listen to the witnesses because we have all
the witnesses requested by the minority. I think you'd learn
something from the witnesses. We have very distinguished
panels, from a mayor and county official to several elected
officials here. And I think if you want to object to or boycott
the mark-up, that's one thing. But I'm disappointed that you
don't want to listen to the statements from the different
witnesses.
Mr. Ford. I apologize to all of them. It's just the
process, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Miller. Let me also make a statement concerning Mrs.
Maloney. I talked to her last week and we tried to juggle the
schedule around her schedule. Congress is in session. We have
to move. This is serious times and we have a very short
timeframe. The census forms are going in the mail next month.
And we can't just put this off for another couple weeks.
This is a process as we're going to have it into full
committee. On the floor, there are going to be plenty of
chances to debate this issue. Mr. Prewitt is going to be
scheduled to a hearing with the full committee in the very near
future.
Mrs. Maloney found time to fly back from the Hague to a
political event in Virginia but she didn't find this as
important, obviously. And that was her decision. But, you know,
we're going to have, I think, a very good set of witnesses and
then we have every witness the minority requested. We didn't
object--and there aren't many cases that happens all the time.
We do have some good ones. We have two Members of Congress.
I'm sorry you won't even give them the respect to stay here for
it, but I think we would like to call the first two witnesses
forward and I see Mr. Sawyer and Mr. Petri. They can come
forward.
Mr. Ford. I'll talk to them on the floor. I'll see you on
the floor, Tom.
Mr. Miller. Thank you very much. I know one of your
witnesses came from Los Angeles, so I'll give him the courtesy
and I appreciate all the members here.
Colleagues, Mr. Petri and Mr. Sawyer, thank you very much
for coming. Ten years ago you all were in part of this seat.
Mr. Sawyer, you chaired the committee back then. Mr. Petri, I
think you were the ranking member, is that right?
Mr. Sawyer. Not 10 years ago.
Mr. Miller. Six years ago, OK.
Mr. Sawyer. That was Tom Ridge of Pennsylvania.
Mr. Miller. OK, that's right. Now Governor Ridge. Let me
welcome both of you and let's go with your opening statement,
and Congressman Petri, if you'd like to proceed.
STATEMENT OF HON. THOMAS PETRI, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS
FROM THE STATE OF WISCONSIN
Mr. Petri. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Fellow colleagues. I
appreciate the opportunity to talk about the importance of a
post-census local review. As a member of the census
subcommittee shortly after the 1990 census, I saw first hand
the important role played by a post-census review in achieving
an accurate count.
Clearly, the Census Bureau is staffed by a team of
competent professionals and those individuals are augmented
every 10 years by an army of committed, short-term workers. But
no matter how qualified and how committed a team you assemble,
no project designed to count 280 million people on a
continental scale will ever be perfect. So there ought to be a
mechanism available for a check, then a double-check, and maybe
even a check again.
Now, it's been said by some that the era of big government
is over. Yet, it's sort of symbolic of what we associated with
the era of big government and arrogance in Washington that we
can assume that a centrally planned and directed census could
reach unerringly into every community and knock on every door.
It's just not going to happen. Mistakes are inevitable.
We're fortunate enough to have at our disposal a resource
capable of correcting these mistakes. Now, the resources are
the local officials of our land. The committed professionals
who live and work in our communities possess a knowledge and a
perspective not even our best statisticians here in DC could
match. So, we ought to encourage their participation and
welcome their assistance. They have a strong incentive to have
an accurate and complete count in their communities. And rather
than having them knock on the door and trying to throw
information over the transom, there should be an orderly
process where they can look at what's been done in their
communities and offer comments and corrections to it. My
understanding is that that's what your legislation outlines.
A post-census local review acts like an independent audit,
bringing in those individuals with an outsider's perspective
and a specialist's focus to assure the Nation that nothing's
overlooked.
The importance of such an audit hit home to me and to my
constituents when a small town in my district, Montello, WI,
received the preliminary census count for their community back
in 1990. To the surprise of the residents of Montello, the
Census Bureau reported they had several hundred fewer people
than they expected, that their town had shrunk in size. This is
quite an error for a town of 1,300 people. During the post-
census review, the local officials were able to demonstrate
that the census had missed an entire ward of the city. And
that's happened in other instances in my district, as well.
That ward was promptly added and the town was returned to its
former status.
Such problems, if not caught, affect everything from
Federal and State funding and political redistricting to the
pride and self-image of communities across our land. The Census
Bureau's decision to provide no mechanism for review is either
a sign of the Bureau's recklessness in addressing accuracy
problems or a sign of its arrogance in believing that it can
avoid all such problems in the first place.
So, I'd like to commend our chairman for having made a
commitment to make available the resources necessary to make
census 2000 the most accurate in history. A vital component in
that effort is a post-census local review. So, I'd urge my
colleagues to ensure its inclusion as a part of census 2000 by
legislation, if necessary, or by decision of the Bureau itself.
Mr. Miller. Thank you, Mr. Petri.
Now, Mr. Sawyer.
STATEMENT OF HON. THOMAS SAWYER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS
FROM THE STATE OF OHIO
Mr. Sawyer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It is a pleasure to be
here with my colleague, Tom Petri, again on this topic and to
see so many old friends at the witness chairs behind me.
If I could just step aside for a moment, I would urge you,
Mr. Chairman, to involve the Bureau itself in this process.
When we were doing oversight, it wasn't a matter of the
minority requesting the Census Bureau to come before us. It was
a matter of fundamental courtesy to the administrative agency
that is responsible for this large and complex undertaking. If
it were possible, I would hope that you could find the time to
do that prior to a markup.
Having said that, I really want to thank you and the
ranking member for inviting me to testify this morning. I know
that your effort is well-intended and I welcome this
opportunity.
Like your effort, the 1990 post-census local review was
well-intentioned, but an ultimately flawed program to tap the
knowledge of local officials in the final stages of the census.
As a former mayor, I understand the importance of involving
mayors and county supervisors and others to help identify
obvious gaps.
The fact is, though, that in the end the PCLR in 1990
became a frantic attempt to make up for deficiencies in
traditional counting methods. We found that the shortcomings of
those methods were widespread and systemic and it was
ultimately futile trying to find missing housing units and
determine who lived there 6 months earlier in the final hours
of the census.
The depth and the breadth of the undercount was an obstacle
that late desperation in the guise of persistence simply could
not overcome. You've heard some of the hard facts about PCLR.
It cost nearly $10 million; it added 125,000 people, some 12
percent of whom were simply wrong. It engaged only one quarter
of the governments that were eligible to participate.
And as a result, recognizing that its counting efforts were
falling short, the Census Bureau also initiated a re-canvas of
selected neighborhoods in the late summer and early fall of
1990. In all, the Bureau visited 20 percent of all blocks in
the country that second time. The combined effort increased the
final census count by one-tenth of 1 percent.
When Tom and I got together, following the 1990 census to
do our evaluation, we quickly came to the conclusion that
building an accurate address list was an essential element to
an accurate census. And frankly, we were amazed to learn that
each 10 years, the Census Bureau starts from scratch to build a
new address list.
It was clear from our hearings that involving local
governments in the development of an address list was critical.
It was equally clear that in involving them so late, at the end
of the process, in the frantic efforts to close out the census,
produced headaches and inaccuracies for both the Census Bureau
and local officials.
Early involvement was far better for both Census Bureau and
local officials. Unfortunately, the condition of the laws at
the time made that quite difficult and so, at the request of
the Census Bureau and the Postal Service, we developed together
the Address List Improvement Act to address these legal
constraints.
By using this new authority, the Bureau's redesigned census
relies on the knowledge of local governments to compile and
verify a master address file of all housing units before the
census starts. Unquestionably, this kind of accurate address
list will substantially increase the likelihood that all
households will receive a form and that enumerators will visit
all those households.
Equally important--shifting a thorough review of the census
and address lists to the front of the process will promote a
higher quality census since information collected late in the
process is unquestionably less reliable.
As the GAO and other evaluators have discovered, as
information moves further away in time from census day, more
and more mistakes are made and the quality of the data is
greatly diminished.
I understand, Mr. Chairman, that your legislation to
require a 1990's-style post-census local review and every
census is a well-intentioned effort to bring knowledge of local
officials to bear on the census process. That is an admirable
goal and one that should run through all stages of censuses,
including planning and preparation and through its
implementation, not focused on the end of the process.
I really must strongly counsel the subcommittee against
tying the Bureau's hands with specific operational
requirements. Particularly, ones that run against the
professional judgment of Bureau staff and may not be wise in
the light of past experience.
In 1990, post-census local review held out great promise
for local governments to improve the accuracy of a census that
more and more Americans were beginning to shun. We face the
same problem coming into 2000. In the end, for all of its
efforts, the program didn't meet expectations. But even if it
had, we cannot not automatically assume that a repeat 10 years
later, based on a census whose design is grounded in the
lessons of the 1960's, is justified.
This country is changing more profoundly and rapidly than
we're able to measure. We will not be the same country in 2000
that we were in 1990 and we must be able to adapt our tools of
measurement to accommodate that change. That's why the Census
Act gives the Secretary of Commerce such wide latitude in
determining how best to conduct the census.
Now, I agree with you that the Congress has the
constitutional responsibility for taking the census and we
should not look the other way while the Census Bureau plans
each decennial count. But I would suggest that perhaps the most
constructive role for Congress is ensuring that the Bureau is
guided by sound scientific and operational knowledge generated
both from within the agency and outside experts and
stakeholders. You and I may have differed on some of those
details but I think we both have agreed on that fundamental
principle.
Following the 1990 census, the Secretary of Commerce
established an advisory committee comprised of a wide range of
stakeholder organizations. That 2000 census advisory committee
has prepared a final report that includes recommendations for
improving the accuracy of the address file before the census
and housing unit coverage during the census. The committee
unanimously endorsed a focused, local review program that gives
local governments an opportunity to review housing units at
various levels of aggregation, depending on their ability to
participate in the pre-census address compilation program.
The committee also endorsed a large, post-enumeration
survey that can serve as the basis for correcting overcounts
and undercounts in the census. We should not second-guess the
advice of this broad group, nor the career professionals at the
Bureau itself. Nor should we render their substantial effort
meaningless by negating or modifying key elements of their
proposals, which fundamentally have to work as a system, all
together, and not as individual items.
I am really grateful to you, Mr. Chairman, for your
continued focus and your detailed interest and I once again
close by the plea that--as long as we're mentioning Steven
Holmes so much this morning, I refer back to an article that he
wrote in November 1998 that was headlined ``Census Chief's
Dream: Grand Tally Minus Politics.'' I take that desire
seriously. I know you do, too. The sidebar is a quote from him
that says, ``Leave us alone and let us do our job is a message
to a glut of overseers.''
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for allowing me to testify this
morning. I look forward to answering any questions.
[The prepared statement of Hon. Thomas Sawyer follows:]
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Mr. Miller. Thank you, Mr. Petri, Mr. Sawyer. We are
getting very close to the beginning of the census. The forms go
in the mail----
Mr. Sawyer. It's true, but the forms are not going in the
mail next month.
Mr. Miller. A year from now and, you know, we don't have a
plan. In the fall of 1997, in the Commerce-Justice-State
appropriation bill, there was money provided and a requirement
that it prepare for two tracks. And last year, during the
appropriation process, I was at a hearing with Secretary Daley,
and they said, ``Where is our plan? We paid for a plan.'' We
still do not have a plan.
In fact, I saw Dr. Prewitt this morning and you know,
hopefully we'll get one next month. I mean, we're getting
dangerously close to starting this process. The Bureau has
spent the past years on an illegal plan. You know, we said it
was illegal back during that Commerce-Justice debate in the
fall of 1997. Six Federal judges last summer said it was
illegal. And, the Bureau kept moving full speed forward on an
illegal plan. And, if we're going to have a successful census,
we can't just keep, you know, putting off the decision. And
that's the reason we need to move forward on this.
And on this post-census local review, I've had two field
hearings: One in Miami and one in Phoenix. And, a lot of the
witnesses here are local officials from cities and counties.
And basically, I'm hearing from all of them, ``We want to have
a chance to check it after the fact.'' And it's hard for me to
understand why--I know it'll be a pain for the Census Bureau. I
will admit that it's a pain to have to do that. But we all have
audits on our books and such. I mean, we expect to have some
checks. You know, they're not perfect.
I don't see where anybody would object. You're a city
councilman and county commissioner. I mean, there's only one
component but it really gets back to the issue of trust. I
mean, you're more familiar with what happened in 1990 than I
am. But, you know, this one is already tarnished because of the
partisanship and the bottom line--we want to count everybody. I
have proposed in my plan that we'll spend all of the money and
resources we need. I'm tossing out ideas. The Census Bureau,
they're saying, ``Well, maybe next month we'll get a plan to
you.'' I mean, that's basically what we're told. That's wrong.
We should have had the plan last summer. Not in March or April
of the year before we do it.
And so there's our frustration, and as I say, Mr. Prewitt
will be before the full committee soon. They're working on a
date with Secretary Daley before the Appropriation Committee on
which I serve.
So, I just don't understand, you know, why anybody would
object to it. $10 million on a $5 billion thing? I mean, you
can't say it's a cost factor. I mean, you know, $10 million is
real money, I would agree, but to help build the trust and
confidence in itself, you know, I just don't understand what
the objection is, besides it's the pain and the Bureau doesn't
want to have anyone looking over their shoulder after the
numbers. But when you have an illustration like Congressman
Petri has, a very specific small town, Mayor Archer was saying
how 45,000 people were added. Don't those people count?
Mr. Sawyer. Mr. Chairman, those people absolutely count. I
have two examples from my own district of exactly the same kind
of thing. They were discovered in post-census local review.
They would have been discovered using the process the Census
Bureau proposes ahead of time and would not have engaged in the
kind of costly and desperate efforts to correct at the end.
I don't think there's anybody here, as Mr. Ryan said, who
is not entirely for the most accurate census that we can
possibly muster. But I must reiterate again that having the
Bureau here--it would really be the people to talk to about a
planning process and an implementation process. Not me, not
Tom. But the Director of the Bureau that is responsible for it.
So, before you mark up this bill, I would hope that you
would take advantage of that most basic expertise that most
people around the world concede makes the U.S. Census Bureau
the most extraordinary demographic statistical agency ever
devised by the mind of humankind.
Mr. Miller. Thank you. We have a number of elected local
officials here. A mayor of Richmond, a county commissioner from
Palm Beach County, FL, so we have some other local officials.
And they're the ones that have to implement it. So, we're
anxious to hear from them. And with that, I will call on Mr.
Davis.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And let me
just say that I share your concerns about planning. I've always
been told that he who fails to plan, plans to fail. But it's
also difficult to plan if you don't know what the playing field
is going to be and if you don't know what you're going to be
playing with. Whether you're going to be tossing one way or
going another way, or what the guidelines and parameters are.
And, so it seems to me that every time the Census Bureau
gets ready to move, here comes another idea, here comes another
possibility. I'd hate to be in that position trying to make a
firm determination.
I've only got two questions. One, Mr. Petri, you talked
about this particular town and these people who were missed.
When they were found, I mean, were they listed any place? Or
did you discover what had actually happened or why they were
missed?
Mr. Petri. Well, I think they just somehow left out a ward.
They didn't realize it was part of the town and thought maybe
it was part of the county and it didn't get counted and it
wasn't included. When they looked at the numbers they said, no,
we know we have more people here in Montello.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. Were they listed in the county?
Mr. Petri. No, they just dropped out of the system. It
happened earlier in the 1980 census in Markizan, where they
missed about 25--there were four wards; they missed one ward.
I don't know if they were, you know, counted at some stage
in the process and then the paper got lost or misfiled, or
mistabulated by the Census Bureau or whatever, but it does
provide a chance for the local people who know what the facts
are or pretty close to the facts, to see a number and they say,
``This can't be.''
To have some process for them to be able to correct that or
have a chance to be heard and if they can make a legitimate
case, then have it corrected. Rather than being told, well, too
bad. We're from Washington and we did the best we could and you
just fell out of--you know, this happens to people in this big
country of ours. That's not what we want to convey if we can
avoid it.
So, providing for some mechanism--you know, Tom said that
the study commission does provide for some post-census audit,
maybe not as necessarily an absolute requirement, but as a
feature of what they feel would be a good procedure.
So, I'm not sure the differences here are all that great.
My understanding is that the chairman's bill basically tries to
codify the procedure that was followed in the last census. The
experts evidently met and referred to that and said this would
be a good practice, to have some procedure. So it sounds like
we're fishing around to find parts and differences about
something that may not really be that great.
I'm concerned, though, that at some point we should be
thinking about trying to simmer down on all of the shooting
back and forth and worry about building trust in the census
process. Because at the end of the day, for it to work, however
it's done, it's going to require a confidence on the part of
the American people to voluntarily participate and step
forward. We had lots of hearings about that. We're very
concerned that people realize that any data that goes into the
census that they tell is absolutely private and cannot be used
for law enforcement or for other reasons. That has to be
communicated to people over and over again so they know this is
not an inspection. This is a census because the data itself has
great value to our country, both for our democracy and for our
economy. Relying on the government, isn't going to work as well
as it would work if all Americans would voluntarily stand up
and be counted. And, it's part of your obligation. You have a
few obligations as a citizen, in addition to rights, and one of
them is to participate in the census every 10 years. You
benefit as a citizen. Our whole country benefits by people
assuming that small degree of responsibility.
Mr. Sawyer. Let me second that. There is no single
commodity that is more critical to the success of any census
than the confidence of the citizenry of the country. Every
resident of this Nation needs to feel confident that they can
be counted and be counted in total privacy and confidentiality.
It was why we took such care in putting together the address
list legislation, so that in working together with the Postal
Service, for the first time in the 200-year history of the
Nation, that people could have confidence that their
confidentiality was protected. Nothing, I think, in the end, is
more important than that.
Let me just add an observation. Those two words, ``trust
me,'' are certainly something that sends shivers up and down
the spines of many Americans. The other two words are ``micro''
and ``manage.'' [Laughter.]
Striking a balance between those two is really what the
oversight process is all about.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, I just have one
question for Representative Sawyer, if I could. You're
recognized as a real expert in this business. I mean, you were
chairman of the subcommittee in 1990, plus you've devoted a
tremendous amount of your own time to actually digging into it
and trying to understand it.
Mr. Sawyer. As most of us do in areas that we focus on----
Mr. Davis of Illinois. After all the reviews after the 1990
census, less than 125,000 people were added. You've looked at
472. Are you optimistic that if it was implemented that we'd be
adding much or changing much or----
Mr. Sawyer. I believe very strongly that local government
involvement early and continuously throughout the process is
critically important to its success. Building in an entire
post-census local review as the vehicle to achieve that local
involvement, I think, places great risk on the single asset
that is in shortest supply after the completion of the count.
That is, time. Because the Bureau and the Commerce Department
are mandated constitutionally to bring the process to a close
and to transmit numbers to the Congress by December 31 of the
census year.
Moving that local involvement much more deeply into the
process early and throughout, I believe, would have found not
only most of the mistakes that were found in post-census local
review, some of which were fraught with mistakes themselves,
but would have helped to diminish the mistakes that were
systemically built into the actual conduct of the census
throughout. It would have given the time necessary to do the
real fine combing of the numbers at the end, rather than being
preoccupied with what turned out to be a desperate effort to
correct what was by then clearly understood to be a profound
undercount in the census.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. Gentlemen, I thank you very much and
Mr. Chairman, I have no further questions.
Mr. Miller. Thank you. I will start going on this 5-minute
rule when we get to the next panels, too. We would now call on
the other members of the committee and we're going to--if you
don't have any questions now. We have three more panels with
some really good witnesses, too. It's not a problem if you
pass.
Mr. Sawyer. Mr. Chairman, I would strongly suggest that the
people sitting behind me can answer many of the questions that
you have----
Mr. Miller. Right.
Mr. Sawyer [continuing]. And while we can offer opinion and
experience from 1990, they bring a good understanding of where
we have been and where we are going.
Let me reiterate one more time, however, the people who
know it best are the Bureau and if you can't have them before
this subcommittee, I would strongly urge you to have a full
committee hearing. Because to proceed with this without hearing
from the Bureau, I think, would be a mistake.
Mr. Miller. Mr. Doolittle.
Mr. Doolittle. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As important as the
census has become, I would think it would be extremely
important to have some ability for local communities whose
vitality in many cases depends upon the outcome of the census.
They ought to have some way to examine these numbers and make
sure that something hasn't been missed. And it seems to me
that's the procedure that you're advocating.
I mean, I represent eight counties and a number of small
communities in northern California and I tell you, I just think
it's inherently fair and appropriate that the local communities
are being counted in many cases by outsiders, or directed by
outsiders, that they ought to be able to examine those numbers
and make sure that everything got counted and is appropriate
and I assume we'll hear directly from representatives of
various communities, perhaps to that effect.
I know the Census Bureau or I understand they don't like
this because they've got the countdown and they want to move on
to finalizing it. But it does seem to me that this is just an
inherent element of due process, I think. And Mr. Petri, I
might just ask you, when this happened the last time, I mean,
this was able to be done and it didn't destroy the system, did
it?
Mr. Petri. Not at all. And I think for the census to work
well, you want the active cooperation of local officials and to
get that they have to figure that putting some effort into this
process is worthwhile. And whether they put the effort in or
not, it's not really going to make any difference because if
the number's wrong, they can't correct it or they have no
assurance that they're going to be able to correct it, I think
this would undermine the atmosphere that you need to have to
elicit as much voluntary cooperation throughout the process. I
have no objection and I think they certainly should be working
very closely for a prolonged period with local officials. But
assuring that at the end of the process they have an
opportunity to take one last kick at the can to make a case if
they think something's undercounted and have people review the
numbers. Seems to me to be fundamental in order to maximize
voluntary cooperation and the feeling that their involvement
will make, or has the potential of making some difference. It's
not a waste of time. It's not going to be decided somewhere
else if they find some mistake, they can actually influence the
final number.
Mr. Doolittle. Thank you and thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Miller. Mr. Ryan.
Mr. Ryan. Well, I'd like to direct my questions toward my
colleague from Wisconsin, Mr. Petri. You must be very proud of
Wisconsin now because, you know, in 1990, I believe, Milwaukee,
WI recorded some of the highest mail response rates in the
country.
I'd like to draw upon your experiences from the 1990 census
and ask you how did you encourage local officials to
participate in the post-census local review effort? What was
the response you got from the local officials? What is your
opinion, how can we improve that? How do we, as Members of
Congress, communicate that? How can the Census Bureau get these
folks involved so we can get this accurate census? Just based
on your experiences, how do you think we can address that?
Mr. Petri. No, I think it's very important. Wisconsin is
proud of the fact that we participate in the census
enthusiastically and completely and, in fact, I'm told that if
they had implemented--and I'd be happy to stand corrected--but
if they had implemented in the last census the adjustment
process and would have provided for adjusting down, as well as
up, they would have actually adjusted our number down, even
though no one disputed that we had an actual overcount.
The mayor of Milwaukee, Mayor Norquist, made it a major
objective of his administration to fully participate; our
Governor did; local officials throughout the State did; the
Members of Congress in both parties and Senate from our State
sent out frequent newsletters and public service announcements
on the radio. We've got the television stations to cooperate
with public service announcements, making it very clear to
people that there was no risk and there would be a reward for
their communities and their State in participating fully and
enthusiastically in the census and it was part of their duty as
a citizen to do that step.
And, I think the word got out quite well and we recruited
actively, tried to get a lot of qualified, retired people from
various communities to work part-time organizing the census as
various outreach efforts into different communities in our
State and that was very successful, too. We got a lot of good,
local talent and they're already coming forward again. They may
be to your office, as well, saying ``I participated in the
census 10 years ago and I'd like the opportunity to do it
again, but you know, I keep calling that 888 number and no one
answers. I get a recording.''
Mr. Prewitt, I wanted to try that number myself and see.
Mr. Sawyer. They ought to call him and ask him about that.
Mr. Petri. Yes.
Mr. Sawyer. One more point.
Mr. Ryan. Sure.
Mr. Sawyer. A very brief addition to it. I think Wisconsin
was a signal effort and an indication to the rest of the
country of what could have been done and what needs to be done
in 2000.
Much of what happened in Wisconsin was reflected in similar
kinds of efforts throughout the Midwest. We had great
difficulty not for lack of effort, but lack of success on both
coasts of the United States, people have posited the reasons
for that. Some of it cultural. There are a variety of things.
It appeared to have little to do with income or anything else.
There was an underlying difference in terms of rate of
participation.
Even that notwithstanding, however, and all of the effort
that was put in Milwaukee, Milwaukee continued to have an
under-count that was twice the statewide average. That ought to
be of concern to all of us. Because it means that there is a
disproportionate undercount of various populations and when we
wind up with that, we wind up with people who simply begin to
disappear and who are not fully counted and fundamentally don't
function as full citizens as those who are fully counted do.
Mr. Ryan. What do you think that the source of that problem
may be? And Congressman Petri, when these advertisements were
conducted, when the promotional activities were done, were
confidentiality and privacy issues at the forefront of the
public service announcements? And were those issues addressed
right away so those concerns were allayed?
Mr. Petri. Absolutely. We made it very clear and the Census
Bureau took the lead and developed various models and had put
various announcements out there that the law prohibited this
data to be used for anything other than census purposes. And
that is a principle that has existed, I think, if not from the
beginning, for a very long time. We underlined it repeatedly
and I think you can't just say it once. I think finally we got
the message out there that this, in fact, was the case and
people relied on it. I think that trust has been maintained. I
don't know of a single instance anywhere in the country where
the census bureau data has been misused for other purposes.
Mr. Ryan. Good. Thank you very much.
Mr. Miller. Mr. Souder.
Gentlemen, thank you very much for being with us today. We
appreciate it. Sorry for the delay.
Mr. Sawyer. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Miller. And I'm sure we will continue to get your
insight and advice as we go along.
Mr. Sawyer. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Miller. We'll move right on to the next panel. I'd like
to call Mr. Blackwell, Mr. Kaine, and Commissioner Roberts. Mr.
Whitener is ill this morning and today and so he is unable to
join us, and Mr. Bourey from Phoenix has to catch a flight, so
we're going to ask him to join this panel, if that's OK. And if
the four of you all would come forward and then I would have
you take a seat because I'd like to call on my colleague, Mr.
Foley, to make a special introduction.
Well, we thank the four witnesses for being here today and
before we go with your opening statements, we have one of our
colleagues, my colleague from Florida, Mr. Foley, who wants to
make a special introduction of one of the witnesses. Mr. Foley.
STATEMENT OF HON. MARK FOLEY, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM
THE STATE OF FLORIDA
Mr. Foley. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. And I do want
to take a moment to introduce to the panel a distinguished
public servant, serving now in her 12th year on the Board of
County Commissioners and a former mayor of the city of West
Palm Beach, one of the largest--in fact, the largest city in
Palm Beach County, the honorable Carol Roberts.
She brings powerful testimony to the benefits of the bill
being considered by your committee today. Of course, I'm
speaking of the issue of post-census local review, a procedure
that allows local officials the right to review census results
and inform census officials of the errors missed or
undercounted by the census. In 1990, the census missed over
20,000 people in Palm Beach County. In the city of Green Acres
alone, 10,000 people were not counted, mostly because the
seasonal residents were out of town.
Luckily, post-census review by local officials like
Commissioner Roberts helped correct the undercount. So, I
believe she will be able to provide extremely important and
valuable testimony and I welcome her to our capital city. Thank
you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Miller. Thank you, Mr. Foley. Thanks for being with us
here today. I'd like to ask all four witnesses if they'd stand
and we'll swear you in for your testimony.
[Witnesses sworn.]
Mr. Miller. And we will begin now with opening statements.
And because of his need to catch a flight, if no one objects,
we'll go with Mr. Bourey, who testified with us about 10 days
ago in Phoenix, AZ. And so, welcome.
STATEMENTS OF JAMES BOUREY, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, MARICOPA
ASSOCIATION OF GOVERNMENTS; KENNETH BLACKWELL, SECRETARY OF
STATE'S OFFICE; TIMOTHY M. KAINE, MAYOR, CITY OF RICHMOND; AND
CAROL A. ROBERTS, COUNTY COMMISSIONER, PALM BEACH COUNTY, FL
Mr. Bourey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, committee members, and
thank you four panelists for allowing me to go first so I can
catch what is, basically, the last flight out today to Arizona.
I'm the executive director of the Maricopa Association of
Governments, a body that represents 24 cities and towns, 2
Indian communities, and 1 county in the Phoenix metropolitan
area. I also serve as representative of the International City-
County Management Association on the Census Advisory Committee.
ICMA members represent more than 3,000 local government units
in the United States. I've also been asked by the National
Association of Regional Councils to represent them, as well, on
census issues.
I appreciate the opportunity to be with you here today to
present testimony. I strongly support the reinstatement of a
post-census local review for census 2000. I cannot see why
anyone would object to providing local governments the
opportunity to obtain a more accurate census count. I work in a
9,200-square-mile area with almost 3 million people. Since
1990, we've added 683,000 new residents, more than the
population of Washington, DC. While the Census Bureau is
compiling its master address list during the next year, we
could be adding more than 40,000 new housing units. A post-
census local review provides a safety net for identifying
recently constructed units. The two maps that were provided to
the committee members earlier today demonstrate some of the
magnitude of growth in our region.
Much has been made about the limited participation in the
post-census local review program in 1990. In Arizona, however,
out of the jurisdictions surveyed by the Department of Economic
Security, 44 out of 49 participated. I also believe that many
more jurisdictions actually participated than statistics would
suggest. Many jurisdictions reviewed preliminary counts and
they didn't find the need to make an adjustment. In our region,
post-census local review resulted in the addition of 3,690
dwelling units and by our estimation, almost $37 million in
Federal and State funds came about because of that.
Our cities were really satisfied with the outcome of the
post-census local review process in 1990. While it added about
a percent to the region, some cities increased very
significantly. Many cities have expressed that support for the
program.
Some argue that a post-census local review is not necessary
because the Census Bureau is providing local communities an
opportunity to recommend updates to the address list prior to
the census. And we commend the Census Bureau for that, for this
pro-active stance. But we believe the post-census review is
also needed.
The total reliance on the update process, the address
update process, could lead to serious undercounts for several
reasons. Many local governments in the United States are not
participating in a LUCA Program, either because they are
unaware of it or because they don't have resources to be able
to participate or it's so far ahead of the census.
Second, there's a massive number of changes that need to
take place in the address file and that's going to make it very
difficult for the Census Bureau to incorporate those changes
and make sure all the housing units are accounted for. One of
our cities has 50,000 housing units that were listed. We have
to add 22,000 housing units to that 50,000. So, the changes are
very, very significant.
In addition, the limited timeframe that our local
governments have had to review the address file, 90 days for
the mail-out mail-back, and only 43 days for the update leave,
may preclude some of them from identifying missing units.
Should post-census local review be reinstated, I would
expect a significant participation rate from local governments
because this technological enhancement since the 1990 census
will make it far easier for them to identify the discrepancies.
Many jurisdictions will already have had a start on the
review because of the address file review that will have been
taking place. Substantial publicity over the sampling debate
and the billions of dollars that are at stake for census 2000
have made many local governments more aware of the importance
of an accurate count.
And finally, the efforts by local governments to advocate a
post-census local review will create a momentum that, I think,
will lead to their participation.
While carrying out a post-census local review is certainly
desirable, it needs to be accompanied by other census programs.
I support additional resources for the census as long as those
resources are deployed wisely. Increasing funding for programs
that encourage people to fill out their census questionnaire
will not be successful, however, if they don't have the census
questionnaire to begin with. More resources are needed
immediately to better enable the Census Bureau to assemble and
verify the units on the master address file.
At a census 2000 roll-out meeting in Phoenix on January 27,
I heard Census Director, Ken Prewitt, remark that the census is
like a portrait of the American family with all its dimensions
and diversity. Without a post-census local review to help
achieve a more accurate census, this family portrait, I feel,
will be incomplete.
Mr. Chairman, committee members, thank you very much for
accommodating my schedule and providing an opportunity for me
to testify. I'd be happy to answer any questions that you might
have.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Bourey follows:]
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Mr. Miller. Thank you very much for being with us. I know
you represent a very large number of cities in the greater
Phoenix area, Maricopa County, and I appreciate your testimony.
Next, we'll just go with Mr. Blackwell and when you have to
leave for your flight, we'll understand. Mr. Blackwell, are you
in town because of the Secretary of States' meeting?
Mr. Blackwell. Both the Secretary of States' meeting and
census meeting.
Mr. Miller. Both. Great. Well, the new Secretary of State
from the State of Florida is one of my constituents, by the
way. She's a newly elected member of the State Cabinet.
Mr. Blackwell. Katherine is very informed and very
effective.
Mr. Miller. Thank you. Yes. Mr. Blackwell.
Mr. Blackwell. Good morning, Mr. Chairman and members of
the subcommittee. I am Ken Blackwell, Secretary of State of
Ohio and co-chairman of the Census Monitoring Board. Thank you
for the opportunity to testify on the merits of post-census
local review. You all received a copy of the February report to
Congress from the congressional members of the Census
Monitoring Board. I would like to offer the executive summary
of that report into today's record.
In our report, the congressionally appointed members of the
Board recommended restoring post-census local review to census
2000. In our opinion, a final quality control check for local
governments to verify the numbers before they are set in stone
is absolutely essential to building trust in the census. Local
review will build trust in the census. Local review will result
in better counts. Local review will correct mistakes. And,
local review will find people and houses that have been missed.
And finally, local review will put people counted in the wrong
place into the right place.
As a former mayor of Cincinnati, I assure you putting
people in the right place is very important. One street is
sometimes the only difference between money for the city and
money for the county. That might seem like small potatoes here
in Washington, but it means a lot in Cincinnati and it means a
lot in Peoria.
This local review will do all of these things in 2000, just
as it did in 1990. But the most important thing it will do, if
the Census Bureau allows it, will be to build trust in the
process and the numbers that determine political representation
and funding for vital public services. Trust is the most
important benefit.
I worry that trust in the census is eroding. As part of our
oversight, the congressional members of the board have
aggressively pursued information from local governments
involved in the census process, in letters and at conferences,
in personal interviews and over e-mail, we have asked the same
questions repeatedly. What is your experience with the census?
What is your experience with LUCA? What is your experience with
post-census review?
Repeatedly, we get the same answers. LUCA is a good idea,
but it falls short of its promise. Local governments are
frustrated with the process. Let me give you a quick example.
Last week, the Monitoring Board received an e-mail from the
city planner from Fort Wayne, IN, which happens to be in
Representative Souder's district. Allow me to read from it
verbatim.
As of today, Groundhog Day, 1999, despite being promised
the address list in November 1998, over a dozen calls to the
Bureau, the involvement of a Chicago bureau supervisor,
fingerpointing by the Bureau among Chicago, Jeffersonville and
Suitland, and the involvement of our U.S. Congressional Office,
we still do not have a printed address list and instructions
for completing the process.
As of today, Fort Wayne has received the materials. But you
can see the frustration. Local governments are not satisfied
with LUCA as their final input into the census. Post-census
local review is a valuable last quality control check.
It will not find everyone missed in the census, but it will
find people. More importantly, it will find people in the exact
block where they live. I can tell you that post-census local
review added or located hundreds of thousands of people during
the 1990 census. Members of the Bureau will counter that it
doesn't add that many, or it isn't or wasn't cost effective, or
it won't fix the whole problem. We can argue until the sun sets
over how to measure additions and contract and corrections or
cost effectiveness or even the extent of the problem.
There are people here today who can tell you better than I
how the numbers add up and how to quantify the value over 10
years of every single person correctly located in the census. I
urge you to listen to them because as local officials, they
know the numbers in their area better than any Washington
statistician.
But the issue is not just numbers. The issue is trust.
Every one of the more than 39,000 local governments in the
country should be able to trust the census to deliver good
numbers to get the services they need to the people that need
them. That's a lot of trust. And as a former mayor, I can tell
you I can trust the Federal Government as long as I can verify.
Post-census local review offers the best chance for
verification. I recently attended the U.S. Conference of
Mayors, meeting here in Washington. I sat on a panel with
Chairman Miller, Representative Maloney and Commerce Under
Secretary Robert Shapiro to discuss the census. I believe the
best comment of the day came not from the panel, but from
Detroit Mayor Dennis Archer who was in the audience. Very
simply, he said, ``We as cities need to have the opportunity
before the census count is in cement to say here is where you
are wrong, and here are the changes we would like for you to
consider. I think we ought to be given that time.''
I think Mayor Archer is right. He is not asking for much.
If the Census Bureau is asking for the trust of every local
government in the country, it is not too much for those
governments to ask for a modicum of verification in return.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Blackwell follows:]
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Mr. Miller. Thank you, Mr. Blackwell, and thank you for all
the work you're doing on the Monitoring Board. As co-chairman,
I've had a chance to meet with you on several occasions, and
it's tough work as we're all involved in making sure we get the
very, very best census we can for the year 2000.
Now, we're pleased to have the mayor of the city of
Richmond with us, and thank you very much for waiting this long
and thank you for coming up from Richmond today. Mayor Kaine.
Mayor Kaine. Chairman Miller, thank you very much, and
thanks to the members of the committee for inviting me today.
I'm the mayor of Richmond, VA, and I'm offering my comments on
behalf of my citizens and also in accord with the position of
the U.S. Conference of Mayors of which I am proud to be a
member.
I will summarize the written comments to make it quicker
and to the point. Because I do make comments on behalf of the
Conference of Mayors, I would like to tender for the record a
survey of the United States concerning the physical undercount
issue that Secretary Blackwell testified about in reference,
and I would offer that into the record.
As mayor of the city of Richmond, the best place to start
is Richmond's 1990 experience. That's where I started as I
began to look at this issue as mayor, and as I was asked to
come and testify. In 1990, the city of Richmond had two
problems in the completion of the census insofar as it affects
our city.
The first was discrepancies in the location of housing
units or failure to identify certain housing units. And then
the second issue, which was more significant in importance to
us, was a serious undercount of people, particularly in poor
and minority neighborhoods. That undercount of people is the
most serious problem that's faced Richmond and that's faced
cities across the country, and I will talk about both of these
problems.
Now in 1990, when we experienced these difficulties,
Richmond did participate through the Census Bureau in post-
census review to try to come to grips with these discrepancies.
That post-census review that we were able to do in 1990 had a
very minor impact, minimal impact on correcting the housing
unit discrepancies. Any correction is obviously good, but the
impact of that correction was de minimis.
We really viewed that the post-census review process in
1990, however, had virtually no effect on the significant
undercounting of people in poor and minority neighborhoods
which is of great concern to us. In order to really work on
these two problems, I know the Census Bureau has tried to
figure, with the guidance of Congress, ways to really address
them. And the LUCA Program, the local updated census addresses
program that the Census Bureau is working on, is something
that's embraced by the city of Richmond, and it is something
that we are finding helpful. That ability, as you know, to
coordinate the various address lists that the city has with
those that the Census Bureau maintains is something that in
Richmond is working well so far. There's more to go, obviously.
But, we believe that particular focus will dramatically
reduce the housing unit discrepancies by requiring more of a
focus on the front end than the back end. The successful
implementation of that LUCA process suggests to me, at least in
Richmond, and Richmond is not, you know, like every other
community, but in Richmond, the successful implementation of
LUCA suggests that the post-census review will probably
continue to be of only marginal benefit. Participating at the
front end is the way we should go rather than participating at
the back end.
There will be benefit, marginal, though, we think, because
the LUCA process will flesh out these problems in advance. Our
concern about post-census review is basically that it does not
address the issue that we think is the most significant and the
one that led me to write the Census Monitoring Board in
October, and that is the issue of undercount of poor and
minority citizens.
This is the key issue for cities like Richmond and cities
elsewhere. Making marginal improvements after the fact is
something I can't be against. I'm the mayor. I want to look at
the numbers. That would be fantastic. But we need more than
marginal improvements. And the tremendous undercount of poor
and minorities, we do not believe will be affected by post-
census review in 2000, just as it wasn't in 1990.
The only way to address that issue is for the Bureau to
have that freedom to use every best scientific method that they
can, including the sampling method that's, I know,
controversial here, but that we believe is required by law of
the 13 U.S.C. Section 195 on the census to take the enumeration
and use those best scientific methods to come up with the most
accurate count possible.
So, I'm privileged to have the opportunity to come speak to
you today. That has been our experience with post-census
review. We think that the effects of it for us would be
marginal at best in 2000. But we look and really need a
solution to the undercount problem that so drastically affects
our city. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mayor Kaine follows:]
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Mr. Miller. Commissioner Roberts, thank you for coming up
today.
Ms. Roberts. Thank you so much. And I do want to thank
Representative Foley for his introduction.
On behalf of the Board of County Commissioners of Palm
Beach County, FL, I want to thank all of you for the
opportunity to appear before this subcommittee and to voice our
support for the reinstatement of the post-census review. In
1980, I served as the Census Field Operation Supervisor for
Palm Beach, Martin and part of Broward County, an area that had
then over 700,000, today well over a million people.
By involvement in 1980, I became aware of the problems
facing the census in achieving an accurate count. As a former
city and now county commissioner, I saw the undercounted
population as a serious issue with many local governments.
The census count serves as a base for revenue sharing for
local governments. A significant undercount in the year 2000
can cost a local government millions of dollars in lost
revenues required to provide needed services of their growing
communities. This is an impact that's not felt just in a single
year, but for an entire decade.
The population count is directly used to apportion seats in
the House of Representatives, to distribute Federal funds and
set policies. In addition, businesses and other groups depend
heavily on the demographics derived from the census data for
market information.
Palm Beach County and its cities--37 cities--have been
working with the Census Bureau in preparation for the year 2000
census. We're concerned that, despite the Census Bureau and our
best efforts, thousands of residents may not be counted in the
census next year.
In 1990, a post-census review allowed local governments to
identify potential undercounts before the census was finalized
and made official. This review has been eliminated, as you
know, for the 2000 census.
In 1990, many cities within Palm Beach County experienced a
significant undercount. It was estimated that at a minimum,
23,000 residents of our county were missed in the 1990 count. A
post-census review enabled some communities to challenge that
preliminary count. As a result of revised counts, Palm Beach
County's reported population was increased.
The city of West Palm Beach, for instance, identified a
384-unit apartment complex that had been missed in both the
initial census mailing and in the followup by enumerators. The
city of Belle Glade, a community of 16,000 people, identified
168 housing units missing from the preliminary counts.
The city of Green Acres, which had anticipated a count
close to 28,000 people, was surprised to be counted at only
18,000 people. During the post-census review, Green Acres
questioned the census finding that 25 percent of its
residential units were vacant. The city subsequently found an
entire development of almost 500 homes missing from the census
numbers.
I could give you many more examples. Census officials noted
at the time that common problems included people being missed
in high-growth western area of our county. To underscore the
potential for miscounts, please note that five communities in
Palm Beach County elected to undertake a special census to
correct undercounts in the 1990 census. Based on the ability to
have a post-census review, four of the cities' recounts
resulted in a population increase of up to 17 percent.
In counties such as Palm Beach where the rate of growth is
more than 20,000 people annually, the post-census review
provides local governments with their best opportunity to
correct miscounts and ensure that as a county, and as well as a
Nation, we obtain the most accurate census possible. An
accurate census will ensure proper government representation
and fair allocation of Federal grant money, as well as useful
data for businesses and other organizations.
We are a rapidly growing community within the
unincorporated portion of our county. Almost 500 homes are
built each month. As we speak here today, another 20 homes will
be completed and ready for occupancy. These homes, as well as
an additional 7,000, may be completed before April 2000. They
may not find their way into the census address list.
These units may well be missed during the regular census.
Only with post-census review will these communities have the
ability to identify these and other discrepancies that could
affect them in the years to come.
From the local government perspective, the post-census
review provides an opportunity to ensure all developments are
counted and that the population count is as accurate as
possible. County and city governments look forward to
continuing our work with the census on the pre-census
activities to get the best count possible. We believe we need
to be given the opportunity to have a post-census review in
order to ensure the most accurate results before finalization
of the 2000 census.
Thank you again for the opportunity to be here, and I'll be
happy to answer any questions.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Roberts follows:]
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Mr. Miller. Thank you very much for all three of your fine
statements. H.R. 472 is just about census local review. By
itself, it doesn't cure all the problems. It is one item in my
proposal of a variety of things, more enumerators, 100,000 more
enumerators, $300 million more in paid advertising, partnership
programs to work with communities to get people to participate
and trust the census. And, this really is a final quality
check. It goes back to what Mr. Blackwell was saying. It is a
trust issue.
Let me clarify, Mayor Kaine. You're not opposed to this?
Mayor Kaine. Let me say that the idea of being able to
touch the numbers myself as mayor of Richmond is something that
I would like to do. So, in that sense, I think the idea of
being able to review the numbers after the census does make a
lot of sense. But, I have three concerns--three caveats.
The first one is that I'm at very much of a disadvantage
with members of the committee because I know you have the
expertise in this area, and I do not. When I hear that the
Bureau of the Census is opposed to this and I don't have the
chance to hear them describe why they're opposed, I get very
humble about the weight of my own opinion. And I would, you
know, sort of be interested in their point on this.
The second caveat that I would have is if the post-census
process at all interferes or diverts timing and resources from
front end to back end. I think that could be a problem, and you
need to make sure that does not happen because it's better to
work hard not to make mistakes than to provide resources to
correct mistakes. So, the focus should be the elimination of
mistakes.
And then the third caveat that I would have, which, again,
I'd like to touch and verify the numbers, is I think,
Congressman Miller, the lead to your question pointed it out.
This solves perhaps some problems, but the most acute problem
that we have in our community, I think, is undercounting in
poor and minority neighborhoods. We do not think this will
solve that one.
To use Secretary Blackwell's example, if a house is put
across the borderline into one of our bordering counties, this
would help it, although we think we'll flesh that out with
LUCA. But, it won't solve the problem of people not accurately
counting the numbers of people that live in the units that we
know are in Richmond, and that is the problem that is most
acute for us that led me to write to the Census Monitoring
Board.
So, would I like to verify the numbers? Would I like to
have my planning staff? Sure, I'd very much like that. But, we
view it as something that is not right at the core issue that
we might have that would lead us to have an undercount that
would affect us in so many areas.
Mr. Blackwell. Mr. Chairman, let me speak about three
things that I've heard today and what the mayor just said. I
think one of the things that we have to do is to make sure that
post-census local review is not viewed as having been replaced
adequately by LUCA in 2000. In theory or in practice, LUCA is
not a sufficient replacement for post-census local review.
LUCA is designed to build the address list. It replaces the
pre-census local review that was conducted in January and
February 1990. Post-census local review is the final quality
check of the actual census counts. The time for post-census
local review could be extended, and more effort should be
devoted to promote the program, as has been done for pre-census
local review, which is now LUCA.
Point No. 2. You know, there's been a lot of talk this
morning about the low participation rate of governments and
post-census local review in 1990. Participation in pre-census
local review during 1990 was only 16 percent. It has nearly
tripled to LUCA's participation rate of 46 percent.
But my guess is that even if the Bureau doesn't choose to
make improvements to the post-census local review process,
those governments participating in LUCA will participate in
post-census local review, if only to make sure that the
corrections they made during LUCA were included in the census.
Finally, a point that has been made this morning is that
LUCA offers 3 months or more to participate when post-census
local review offered only 15 days. If local governments didn't
have enough time in 3 weeks, give them 6 weeks. LUCA is an
excellent program, but it does not replace, I underscore again,
post-census local review. It expands on pre-census local
review, and I think that what we can do is to make sure that we
give post-census local review the same sort of attention and
resources to make it better as we've given to pre-census review
in the name of LUCA.
Mr. Miller. Thank you. Ms. Roberts.
Ms. Roberts. Yes. Post-census review is obviously not the
mecca or the answer to everything any more than LUCA is. But
just to give you an example, the city of West Palm Beach after
the last post-census review, there were 180 people that were
added to the population. The city itself, not being satisfied
with that, later pursued a special census at the cost of
$350,000, and they found an additional 7,700 people. So, with
the post-census review, they still went ahead and did an
additional census.
The city of South Bay, which is a little tiny city of 3,558
people in the 1990 census, went ahead at the cost of $20,800,
which is a lot of money to a little farming community, and
increased their census count by 17 percent by doing a special
census.
So, post-census review allows local governments to have the
input to be able to look to see exactly where something is
lacking. And, if they're still not satisfied as a number of the
communities in my area are, they can go forward and prove the
additional people. But, it is important to have that.
Mr. Miller. Thank you. Mr. Souder.
Mr. Souder. So I understand what you were saying, Ms.
Roberts, you're saying that even though you're hoping LUCA
works well, and even though you're confident that everybody's
trying to work with you, and that it's going to cost some
money, you would still like to have that review.
Ms. Roberts. Yes, we're a growing community. We are growing
so rapidly that we are going to miss even in LUCA some of the
units that are being built toward the end--right before the
census starts.
Mr. Souder. In your opinion, why would any elected official
oppose it?
Ms. Roberts. I'm not sure why. I have one sitting next to
me. I don't know how fast Richmond's growing, but I know Palm
Beach County. And, I can tell you that my own experience is
having hired 700 local people because I was a field operation
supervisor in the 1980 census. We went out in 1979. We counted
units. We did much of what Under Secretary Blackwell talked
about and what Congressman Petri talked about--having local
people involved.
We still had missed units. Some of them are funny stories.
Nobody wanted to go count the local nudist colony. It was very
hard to find somebody who wanted to go out and count the nudist
colony. Yet, there were people who went there. I had three
different people go out and walk back and say they weren't
going in there.
Yet, we found that when we counted units, Palm Beach County
was growing rapidly in the 1980 census. We were still off. When
you grow at 20,000 units a year, you're going to miss
something. We're going to miss something in LUCA, and we
believe it's important to be able to have that post-census
review in order to find where we've missed those units.
Mr. Souder. And Mayor Kaine, I think you've made your
position clear. Tell me if I've mischaracterized.
Mayor Kaine. Yes.
Mr. Souder. You don't oppose the review.
Mayor Kaine. I'm sorry.
Mr. Souder. You don't oppose the review.
Mayor Kaine. No.
Mr. Souder. You said the Census Bureau opposes it.
Mayor Kaine. Indeed.
Mr. Souder. But you don't oppose it, and you just don't
feel it's the preeminent issue. Now, let me ask you another
question.
Mayor Kaine. Yes, and that's accurate. It doesn't speak to
our condition. It may speak to other conditions. It doesn't
speak to ours and of other cities like ours.
Mr. Souder. And you said at the beginning of your testimony
you represented the U.S. Conference of Mayors.
Mayor Kaine. Correct.
Mr. Souder. Is their official position that they also
support the review?
Mayor Kaine. They have not taken a position for or against.
They have not taken a position for or against this bill.
Mr. Souder. So are they for or against this bill or for or
against post-census review?
Mayor Kaine. They have not taken a position on this bill.
Mr. Souder. Are they on record as for census review in the
past?
Mayor Kaine. Well, as an example----
Mr. Souder. A bill becomes a political dynamic in
Washington.
Mayor Kaine. Indeed.
Mr. Souder. I was asking about the principle.
Mayor Kaine. Yes, indeed. There was a good bit of
discussion about this at the U.S. Conference of Mayors meeting
that we had 2 weeks ago. And I also heard Mayor Archer speak
about how it had helped Detroit in 1990, and that it might be
something that would be helpful again.
But, he was also very adamant that something like the post-
census review is part of a package. Accuracy and measures like
statistical sampling and other scientific methods have to be
part of that package. And, I don't think he would want to have
one piece pulled out and said this is what he supports and
nothing else.
So, I think the Conference of Mayors supports a package of
things that would lead to the most accurate survey, but they
have not taken a position on this bill. They certainly haven't
said we oppose post-census review. They've not taken that
strong a position.
Mr. Souder. I think that would be a politically untenable
position for the mayors who may not have been at the national
meeting to think that their national association was saying
that they shouldn't have the right to review their counts.
Mayor Kaine. Right. And that's why I made my point that I
do not oppose it.
Mr. Souder. I'd be very careful where you're headed here
because you're plunging into a politically controversial
question of should we count real people versus statistical
guesses at real people and then saying as part of that we don't
want a review.
Now, you want a review regardless. We have to sort out the
sampling part here.
Mayor Kaine. Sure.
Mr. Souder. As a mayor, I can't imagine that you don't want
to have a review. Secretary Blackwell.
Mr. Blackwell. In reviewing the resolutions and the
discussions of the U.S. Conference of Mayors, I think it is
fair to say that, in principle, they favor post-census local
review as a last quality control check.
Do they want more? Do they want more tools at their
disposal? The answer, as the mayors indicated, is yes. But, did
they debate this specific piece of legislation? No, they
didn't.
But, you know, this also gives me, Congressman, an
opportunity to say that, you know, I can respect the Bureau's
resistance to what they might perceive as undue political
influence. I really do think it is important to keep in mind
that post-census local review is not about Congress or the
Commerce Department fighting for the last word on the census.
Post-census local review is about local governments having
a say and a quality control check in the process at the front
end and at the back end. And since local governments serve and
represent the people that pay for the census in every sense, I
don't think it's too much to ask that they have some say in the
outcome and the final numbers.
Mr. Souder. Mr. Chairman, if I could make a brief comment
because my home-base city where I live was alluded to in Mr.
Blackwell's testimony. I am very concerned that, for political
reasons, we have focused so much attention and the
administration has focused so much attention on trying to
promote sampling that they haven't been doing the basic things
that need to be done.
I get complaints in my congressional office about how the
Census Bureau in my home town isn't getting what they need. And
then I hear people come in to Washington and go on national TV
and talk about how they're worried about an undercount.
Well, yes, there's going to be an undercount if they don't
have the maps, if they don't get the people hired, and if they
don't know where their city lines are if the Census Bureau
can't get the information.
A lot of whining at the end that we don't have an accurate
count is not justified because some people wanted to sit down
at some computer and figure out some mathematical vision of how
many people were in a place.
Step No. 1 is get your job done and get the information out
there. Then, work with the mayors and the other county
officials to make sure that gets done. Then, do a post-census
review. We need to work and make sure. This Congress has
committed that we'll spend the money.
And, what we need are plans out of the U.S. Conference of
Mayors to say, look, we're very worried. We have mobile
immigrants who don't want to be counted. We have homeless that
don't want to be counted. We have people who for a variety of
reasons don't want to be counted. We need proposals as to how
to count them because ultimately in the courts, the American
people aren't going to count fictitious people. Now it hits my
home town, they didn't have the basics.
So, why are we here in Washington arguing about how we're
going to do it if they aren't even implementing the basic
fundamental count. Anything else is just a supplemental. I'm
sorry I got aggravated. But all of a sudden, it hits pretty
much home. In the theoretical, what we've been fighting about
in Washington is my home town. Hopefully, it will at least
count my family.
Mayor Kaine. I took that comment as somewhat responsive to
some of the things I was saying.
Mr. Souder. It was not. [Laughter.]
Mayor Kaine. Sure. I agree with you. And the idea is to get
outraged and do as much as we can upfront because I think
whatever we might debate about methods--and I'm not savvy
enough about this to debate method with anybody on this
committee, the mayors want the best methods upfront.
I want to verify it later. This undercount problem which is
a particular one--you mentioned the homeless and people in poor
and minority neighborhoods. That's the one we have. That's the
one you have in your community.
We really think that there are ways upfront to deal with
that, and that is our primary interest.
Ms. Roberts. Representative--sorry. In Florida, and
Representative Miller knows this, we're not only incorporated,
but we're unincorporated. And Palm Beach County has about 50
percent of its population where I am. Literally, Palm Beach
County's government is the only government.
So, we in effect have the same problems that the cities
have. We want to be sure that everybody gets counted. Palm
Beach County, much to many people's surprise, is the largest
agricultural county in the State of Florida and the fourth
largest in the Nation.
We have illegal immigrants. We have homeless. We have
migrants, as well as what our name suggests. So, the problems
that we have are the same as any large city. This is a county
of well over a million people.
We have the enormous growth, as well as homeless, as well
as migrants, as well as a lot of illegals who really don't want
to be counted. So it is important to us to have post-census
review. But we know it's not the only answer. Counties in
Florida as counties in many places in the United States have
the same problems. They're not all cities.
Mr. Miller. The Supreme Court essentially settled the
argument about sampling. So, we keep rehashing something that
is illegal. It doesn't really get us to our goal, which is to
get everybody counted. And, this is just one component of the
whole thing.
Let me ask one final question, if I may, Ms. Roberts. What
is Palm Beach County doing as far as support and resources, and
how is it structured within county government or city
government as far as providing the Census Bureau to get the
best number possible?
Ms. Roberts. Palm Beach County assigned someone in the
county specifically to the census. We also have 38 cities. We
have the unique county in Florida. We have more cities than any
other county in the State. So, our larger cities are also
cooperating because they have the resources to do it.
We have many smaller cities. I named South Bay for one,
which has 4,000 people, and it's a farming community. A lot of
our smaller cities don't have the resources. And, the county is
attempting to help them with LUCA. But we're working with the
Census Bureau in cities like West Palm, Boca Raton, Boyton
Beach, Delray Beach. They're all larger cities, and they have
the resources to also work with the Census Bureau.
Mr. Miller. I think most of your colleagues, the mayors and
the commissioners, recognize the critical importance to do
everything they can to make sure the census gives us the best
number possible.
Ms. Roberts. It means dollars to us.
Mr. Miller. Right.
Ms. Roberts. So, I can assure you that we're putting all
our resources that are available.
Mayor Kaine. We all have that interest.
Mr. Miller. Well, remember, Ms. Roberts, you come from an
interesting perspective having worked for the Census Bureau
back in the 1980's.
Well, let me thank all three of you all for being with us
today. We appreciate your testimony, and we all agree on the
final goal. And, we just need to keep working step by step to
make sure we get there. Thank you very much.
Mayor Kaine. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Roberts. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Miller. We'll move now to the next panel, Mr.
Boatwright and Ms. Welty. If you all would just remain standing
so I can swear you in as witnesses, please. Raise your right
hands.
[Witnesses sworn.]
Mr. Miller. Welcome. I'm sorry. You know, these things go
on and on. We're lucky. Fortunately, we haven't had any votes
yet today, and so we have not been called away. But let us
continue with your opening statement. I appreciate both of you
being here, and we'll go with Mr. Boatwright first.
STATEMENTS OF LANIER BOATWRIGHT, PRESIDENT, NATIONAL
ASSOCIATION OF DEVELOPMENTAL ORGANIZATIONS; AND BARBARA WELTY,
BOARD MEMBER, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF TOWNS AND TOWNSHIPS
Mr. Boatwright. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and members of the
subcommittee for the opportunity to testify today on the need
to reinstate the post-census local review for the 2000 census.
My name is Lanier Boatwright, and I'm the executive
director of the McIntosh Trail Reasonable Development Center in
Griffin, GA. I'm also president of the National Association of
Development Organizations. Accompanying me today is the city
manager of Barnesville, GA, Kenneth Roberts, who was involved
in the post-census review after the 1990 census.
The National Association of Development Organizations or
NATO is a national public interest group founded in 1967 to
help economic development professionals and local elected
officials share information and ideas. The Association is the
leading advocate for reasonable approach to economic and
community development in America's small metropolitan and rural
communities. We're also a part of the Census Bureau's
Partnership Program.
Our general members of the service delivery mechanism for a
variety of State and Federal programs provide a wide range of
technical assistance to local governments. All of these
organizations were established by State law or Executive order
and have strong relationships with their local elected
officials and governments.
The McIntosh Trail Reasonable Development Center serves
127,000 residents in the Middle Georgia region, which includes
Butts, Lamar, Pike, Spalding and Upson Counties, and 16 cities
and towns with populations from 138 to 21,500. Our primary
mission is to offer community and regional planning, economic
development, mapping services and other requested services to
local governments and municipal governments.
We also act as an interface between local, regional and
State agencies for planning and public information initiatives
like the U.S. Census. In preparation for the 2000 census
through an appropriation from the Georgia Legislature, the
Georgia Department of Community Affairs has contracted with
Georgia's 16 regional development centers, which includes the
McIntosh Trail RDC to provide technical assistance to local
governments for the local update of Census addressing program.
As a State with a 2.124 percent undercount in 1990, we
certainly understand the importance of obtaining an accurate
count.
Mr. Chairman, I'm here today to discuss three main issues
why the Census Bureau should reinstate post-census local review
for the decennial census. First, Mr. Chairman, the pre-census
activities such as the LUCA Program are inadequate substitutes
for the post-census local review.
While we completely support and embrace these programs, we
also recognize that only approximately 18,000 of the Nation's
39,000 units of local government are actively working with the
Census Bureau to update the master address file.
In addition, only 32 of the 62 local governments actually
participated in the LUCA Program's process during the target
address rehearsal in Columbia, SC, and that was according to
reports from the General Accounting Office and the Presidential
Members of the U.S. Census Monitoring Board.
That's why NATO has been urging the Census Bureau to work
through the network of the 320 regional development
organizations, to help rural local governments participate in
the LUCA process. Despite understanding the importance of the
census, the bottom line remains that the vast majority of local
governments do not have the staff or financial resources
necessary to fully participate in pre-census activities such as
LUCA.
As we found in 1990, many local governments believe there
were undercounts in the area but couldn't even afford an
appeal. Second, Mr. Chairman, local governments should have an
opportunity to ensure the accuracy of the census numbers before
they're final.
There are too many consequences from inaccurate counts.
Besides the well known outcome such as a loss of a
congressional seat or in Federal aid, many small to medium-
sized communities have encountered other problems. In 1990, a
small city in Alabama successfully challenged its count and had
it adjusted from 1,880 to 2,281 people. However, another small
Alabama city informed the Census Bureau that it was improperly
counted, but ultimately it was never corrected.
These two cases are significant because in Alabama a
municipality is designated a city only when it has 2,000 or
more people. Unfortunately, the city that remained incorrect
had to change its name and lost all the revenues it would ever
see with an accurate count or under 2,000.
There are many other examples across the country, including
in Pennsylvania where the North Central Pennsylvania Regional
Planning and Development Commission helped a small community
actually appeal an overcount. If the census numbers had been
accepted, the town would have been ineligible for their rural
development programs.
When one of the towns in my region, Barnesville, which has
a population of 4,747, tried to appeal in 1990, they were
discouraged by the Census Bureau. In 1996, when the estimates
were released by the Census Bureau, it was reported they had
actually lost 100 people. Because the city provides
electricity, water, sewer, gas through its own utility, it
knows exactly how many residents it has.
It also has a state-of-the-art geographic information
system with exact addresses by census tracts. The city appealed
the 1996 estimate and provided the agency with maps but never
received a response.
As you can see from these examples, these issues of an
accurate count are not only in urban areas and large suburbs,
but also in America's small towns and cities and counties.
Regardless of the outcome of the debate, our main concern is
that we achieve an accurate count at both the national and
local level.
And third, Mr. Chairman, local governments can't afford
inaccurate counts for their areas. This census has long lasting
implications at the local level. Over billions of dollars in
Federal aid to State and local governments are in jeopardy, and
literally hundreds of thousands of dollars for individual
communities.
With almost a $3 billion budget, we strongly believe that
the Census Bureau should have provided some financial
assistance to help local government. While the time restraints
for preparing the 2000 census may prohibit such a program, the
Census Bureau should help communities with a sound case
participate in opposed census review processes.
Several large cities also have announced they plan to
challenge the 2000 count, and these are communities who have
already participated in LUCA and yet still value the importance
of an appeal process.
We believe all local governments should have a fair chance.
In closing, Mr. Chairman, those three main points were, first,
the pre-census activity, such as the local updated census
addresses program, is not adequate as substitutes for the post-
census local review.
Second, local governments should have an opportunity to
ensure the accuracy of the census numbers before they're final.
And third, local governments cannot afford inaccurate counts
for their areas.
Thank you again for the opportunity to testify today on
behalf of the National Association of Development
Organizations, and I would be happy to answer any questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Boatwright follows:]
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Mr. Miller. Thank you, Mr. Boatwright.
We do have a vote, but we have enough time for Ms. Welty to
make her presentation, please. Welcome, again.
Ms. Welty. Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman, and members of the
subcommittee. Thank you for this opportunity to appear before
the subcommittee on the census in support of Chairman Miller's
bill, H.R. 472.
Before I go into detail about why a 45-day post-census
review is essential to ensure a fair and accurate count for
local communities, allow me to introduce myself and tell you a
little bit about who I represent.
My name is Barbara Welty, and I am a board member of the
National Associations of Towns and Townships [NATAT]. I am also
the elected clerk of Catheo Township in Mille Lacs County, MN
and a member of the Census 2000 Advisory Committee.
NATAT represents approximately 11,000 towns and townships.
Most of these are small and tend to be rural. There are 39,000
general purpose local governments throughout the country of
which we represent approximately one quarter, 82 percent of
which have a population of 50,000 people or less. Nearly half
of all local government have fewer than 1,000 residents. Almost
one-third of all local governments have no paid full-time staff
and rely mostly on volunteers or part-time workers to fulfill
the needs of their citizens. And, this is especially true for
townships.
The decennial census process must include local governments
at all stages. The process must take into account limited
staffing and resource capabilities of many local governments,
as well as their hands-on knowledge about their community.
The purpose of this testimony is to highlight the special
needs of smaller communities and to reiterate the importance of
a 45-day post-census review as described in Chairman Miller's
bill, H.R. 472.
In 1990, part of the problem in reaching small communities
began with the pre-census local review. Only 21,000, or
slightly more than half of all local governments, were eligible
to participate. And according to GAO, less than half of those
eligible actually took part.
For the 2000 census, the Bureau instituted a new program
referred to as LUCA, local update of census addresses. LUCA has
replaced the pre-census local review of 1990, and this is
intended to give local governments the same opportunity to
correct potential miscounts by providing them with the Bureau's
address list and maps of the area before the actual census.
We support the LUCA process. However, despite the Bureau's
efforts and, indeed, the efforts of organizations such as ours,
there are only 78,105 local governments now participating in
the LUCA process to date. This leaves 21,895 local governments
without pre-census involvement.
There are a variety of reasons why localities may not be
participating in the LUCA process, and I mentioned some of them
in my written testimony. The bottom line is that the majority
of local governments are not participating in the LUCA process
often because of inherent special needs of smaller communities
and the lack of Federal funding to help communities
participate.
It is the obligation of Congress and the Bureau to ensure
that these special needs are addressed. In my written
testimony, I refer to a survey we conducted after the 1990
census. A reoccurring complaint from survey respondents was
that the 15 days allotted for the post-census local review was
not enough time to adequately complete an analysis.
Today, more than one-half of all local governments are
still not participating in any form of pre-census review and,
therefore, need the benefit of a post-census review. Testimony
by the General Accounting Office in September 1990 supports our
assertion that small communities are at a disadvantage in the
census process.
GAO identified two reasons smaller communities did not plan
to participate in the post-census review. No. 1, a lack of
funds, expertise or other resources to carry out the program.
No. 2, a lack of housing unit data of their own at the block
level required to challenge the Bureau counts. This was
especially true of small populations with communities and
populations of less than 12,500. The GAO findings contradict an
earlier Bureau assertion that non-participation in post-census
local review is an indication of acceptance of the preliminary
count.
Local communities often want to participate, but they do
not have the resources to do so effectively. The onus lies on
the Bureau and Congress to ensure that smaller communities have
the opportunity and the necessary tools to participate fully in
the census process.
Given the limited revenues and human resources, it is only
fair that they be given a reasonable amount of time to prepare
their challenges. Because most local governments are not
participating in a pre-census review like LUCA, eliminating the
post-census local review gives them no opportunity to challenge
the Bureau's data. Even if a locality cannot wade through the
data received during the LUCA process, it should not be denied
the opportunity to at least review the results.
In a locality that for whatever reason never heard of LUCA,
the process should not be penalized by not having any input
into the accuracy of the data for its jurisdiction. Completing
the census is an extremely difficult undertaking. We appreciate
the magnitude of this job. A 45-day post-census review, as
proposed in H.R. 472, is one way, but only one way, to help
ensure that our smaller communities are more accurately
accounted for. We need and want an accurate census. Thank you
for this opportunity to present my testimony.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Welty follows:]
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Mr. Miller. Thank you both for your final testimony. I
thank you all for submitting your testimony early enough.
We do have a vote. I think it's going to be two votes. So,
it's probably the amendment and final passage.
So, we'll take a recess. If you all can stay, we'd like to
ask a few minutes for questions when we come back, and then
we'll go to the final panel. If I had to guess right now, we're
talking about 20 minutes or so by the time we get back. So
we'll take a recess.
[Recess.]
Mr. Miller. Thank you very much, and sorry for the need to
go vote. Actually, we were very fortunate that that's the only
set of votes so far today, and I think we're free for the rest
of the hearing.
Let me begin by a couple questions and get some
clarification. Mr. Boatwright, I just talked to you a minute
ago. But your development is equivalent--what we have in
Florida is the regional planning councils.
Mr. Boatwright. Yes sir. The council's a government in some
States, planning development districts.
Mr. Miller. And you're the national president of that
organization?
Mr. Boatwright. Yes sir.
Mr. Miller. One of the concerns, I think, you expressed,
and just clarify again with me, is that a lot of communities
have a lot of good information, and the only way they have a
chance is that they can help right now in the local address.
How is that going in your sense?
Mr. Boatwright. In my region, it's going very well. We have
two tiers. The larger counties go first, and now the next group
of counties are coming in, and we're finishing up the mapping
then.
Mr. Miller. Ms. Welty, are you working? How's it going so
far in your area?
Ms. Welty. Up until this point, the LUCA Program has been
not heeded very well, I guess, with smaller local governments.
However, I was just at a LUCA training in our general area last
week, and the original plan for that meeting as I called 3 days
ahead of time only had 10 members enrolled or registered to
attend. By the time the meeting progressed, they had over 100.
Most of them, I must say, also happen to be township
officials that were there. We had very few cities and very few
counties. The cities, basically their portion of LUCA should be
considered completed by now. However, in the same instances
that happened earlier as mentioned, in Fort Wayne, we had
several cities at that meeting that still had not gotten their
LUCA maps from the city addressed LUCA programs.
Mr. Miller. Well, I think we're all pleased that we have
the LUCA Program, and we learn every year better ways to
improve the census, and LUCA is certainly one of the
improvements we have this time around.
I'm still baffled why a few of the Bureaus are opposed to
post-census local review because of the trust issue. It can't
do any harm. I know it's a pain for some of the people in the
Bureau. But I can't imagine seeing any harm to it?
Ms. Welty. Absolutely not. I guess because of my
involvement with the Census 2000 Advisory Committee, I also do
a lot of talking about the census to different groups. When I
first started to inform them that there would be no review
after, most of the people that were there were aghast at the
fact that we couldn't check after, that's it. The LUCA process
is it. And, I had to say at that point, yes.
So, local officials very much support a review.
Mr. Boatwright. I also think, of course, part of the
problem is that local governments will react more strongly
after they have numbers and information placed in front of them
so that you'll have a natural reaction when you have numbers.
So that before the census actually takes place, some may
not put as much credence in the LUCA process. Again, in
Georgia, we were lucky because our State went to all the RDCs
and said help us in this process and gave us a small amount of
funding to assist. But otherwise, we would have a lot that
wouldn't participate if we didn't have the regional
involvement.
Mr. Miller. Do you know what's happening in other States?
As far as the State of Georgia says it's giving $50,000 to each
of the planning districts, development districts. Is the
Minnesota State Legislature?
Ms. Welty. No. And that by far is the exception to the
rule. Most States have not, to my knowledge, been able to help
any toward resources or have not at this point at least.
Mr. Miller. Ms. Welty, you're on the Census Advisory Board,
right?
Ms. Welty. Yes, I am.
Mr. Miller. Appointed by the Secretary of Commerce?
Ms. Welty. Yes.
Mr. Miller. Has the Census Advisory Board taken a position
on this issue?
Ms. Welty. No, we have not. We discussed it, actually, at
one of our last meetings, and it's a divided issue, the same as
it is here. But I would say all of the local governments that
are represented on that committee were all in favor of a post-
census review.
Mr. Miller. How many communities are you representing, Mr.
Boatwright, in your district?
Mr. Boatwright. Oh, I'm 5 counties and 16 cities or towns.
Mr. Miller. How many of them would you say have relatively
sophisticated ways to count people?
Mr. Boatwright. I would say, again, with the city of
Barnesville, although it's under 5,000 by census numbers, it
has a very sophisticated geographic information system. The
county seats of each of our counties are municipal electric
authority cities that provide that utility. So, they have
access to information and billing going to customers. I mean,
if you think they read a meter at every household, you know,
that's 120 times in 10 years.
But on the other hand, we think that the smaller
communities, because we've got a lot of communities that are
under 300, don't have the staff and personnel to even begin to
address this issue. Again, that's where the regional
organization comes in to help.
If they don't have that, they don't have the personnel to
respond adequately, we think, to the LUCA process.
Mr. Miller. And the basic idea is that these communities
just want to check the numbers. I mean, even a small community,
I guess, of 300 with a volunteer mayor or something maybe, they
can at least have that chance.
Mr. Boatwright. Well, within a small community you know
everybody. But with the city of Barnesville that's here today,
in the last 90 days they've taken a photograph of every primary
structure in their city of over 1,800, and they added that to
their GIS system. So the local elected officials know who's
there and have a way to find out, through many different ways.
Mr. Miller. Thank you. Mr. Davis.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Had I been here when Mayor Kaine was testifying, I had a
question that I would have asked of him that related to
mispopulation. The question would have been that in 1990, 70
percent of the population missed in the census were in housing
units that were enumerated. Of course, with blacks, 80 percent
of the black population missed in 1990 were in housing units
that were enumerated.
The question would have been how does the post-census local
review address this mispopulation. Of course, I was not here
and did not ask him the question. But the verification of what
I was looking for is contained in a letter from Mr. Ludington
from the Brookings Institute. And I would ask unanimous consent
if I could have that letter entered into the record.
Mr. Miller. No objections.
[The information referred to follows:]
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Mr. Davis of Illinois. At that time. I have a question of
Ms. Welty. In your written statement, you say that you
conducted a random sample of your members to determine the
overall success of the 1990 census.
You also say that 52 percent of the respondents were from
communities with populations greater than 5,000, and that they
rated the Census Bureau's communication effort as good or
excellent, while 66 percent of the respondents from communities
with fewer than 5,000 residents labeled the Bureau's
communication as being fair to poor.
So that I can put your numbers in the proper context, could
you tell me how many of the 11,000 local governmental units
that you represent were surveyed?
Ms. Welty. I don't have that actual figure. We actually had
140 responses out of 32 States. But through the course of the
last 10 years, the actual amount of surveys that were sent out,
I cannot tell you that.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. What you're saying is that the
responses were probably less than 65 percent.
Ms. Welty. I would guess yes.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. If that would be the case, would you
have any estimation or any guess as to why so few of them
actually participated?
Ms. Welty. Basically, it's resources and understanding the
process. The pre-census in 1990 was very difficult. It was
geared toward large cities so that the smaller communities of
which our Association represents were not able to be involved
in that. And at that point, until a post-census review was
made, those cities did not--or I shouldn't say cities, but
those communities did not really heed the census.
As Mr. Boatwright just mentioned, once they got the final
count and they realized that they were way under what they
thought, many of the communities wanted to participate. Many of
them financially weren't able to challenge or were discouraged
from challenging because it was a more difficult process than
what they had capabilities of doing.
So, many of those people who could have challenged, perhaps
should have challenged, did not for several reasons.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. If that is the case, would that not
support the Bureau's contention that this really is not the
most effective way to get that kind of information.
Ms. Welty. No, I don't think so because with the new LUCA
Program, first of all, there's involvement from the very
beginning that they have been informed of. However, there are
people who have still not gotten the proper notification
because of some problems with mailings and stuff. But now that
they know that that process is out there and many of them have
participated, we were saying 50 percent now basically have
agreed to participate in the LUCA process. They know that it's
out there.
Right now, we're trying to encourage. Again, many of our
members are from small communities that we call in the Census
department real address systems. So, they are just now getting
their maps and the involvement of, I am hoping, the involvement
of townships will get considerably more because of the process
that's just starting now.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. And so, even though they didn't
participate before, you think that they have a different level
of awareness?
Ms. Welty. They have a much greater awareness.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. And what would likely follow up?
Ms. Welty. Yes, they have a much greater awareness. And
once that process has begun, they really feel that they want a
chance to review at the end the final figures. And this, as I
say, has come back from many of the local officials.
They feel that as an elected representative from the
community that they represent, they should have and they must
have a review at the end, at the final process, before the
numbers are out.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. Mr. Boatwright, I understand that
only 25 percent of all governmental units participated in the
post-census local review in 1990. Would you be able to tell us
what percentage of the rural communities that you represent
participated in 1990.
Mr. Boatwright. In the post-census?
Mr. Davis of Illinois. Yes.
Mr. Boatwright. In my region, I can tell you. And I can
tell you that approximately 50 percent tried to participate in
the post-census review. However, in several cases, there was no
response.
Again, the city of Barnesville, 4,774 in 1990. The 1994
estimates came out and showed about 5,400 plus in that
community. The 1996 estimates came out and showed 4,600. And
the discrepancies were up and down, you know, since 1990, and
they provided maps and made an appeal and never heard back.
So I am very certain of the specific communities in my
region that have done that. It was about 50 percent.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. If asked to participate in the local
review now, what numbers would you project?
Mr. Boatwright. Well, I would project that if they were
asked now if they would participate in a review process
afterwards, 100 percent, because I feel that the local
governments want to have some say so in the verification.
We have evidence and it's in my testimony that there are
cities that are participating in the LUCA Program now that
still want to participate in a post-census review process.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. Thank you, Mr. Boatwright.
Ms. Welty. Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Miller. Yes.
Ms. Welty. I'm going to lose my voice yet. I'm sorry. Could
I just quickly address two things, and one of the things which
I failed to mention which is probably the most important.
Increasing the post-census review from 15 days to 45 days is
ultimately the goal. It must be done 15 days in small
communities. Sometimes there's nobody at an office for 15 days.
So they might have received the maps and be sitting in the
office. But the person that works with them wasn't even there.
So, that is a very important thing. And regarding the PCLR,
it failed basically for several reasons. And one of them,
again, was that the pre-census review was limited and it was
difficult to participate in which I mentioned.
Another one is that the period of time of 15 days was just
too short. And the LUCA process is flawed. Now we know that.
This post-census review would definitely help us correct that
at the point that LUCA has fallen down.
And I do support LUCA. I think that it's the way to go and
the way to go to the future. I would hope that it would be
continued beyond 2000, that we can continue that list and
update it.
Mr. Miller. Thank you all both very much for coming here
today. We appreciate your testimony and your statements and
your responding to the questions. Thank you.
Mr. Boatwright. Thank you.
Mr. Miller. And we'll proceed on now to the third panel,
Dr. Ehrlich, Dr. Bryant and Ms. Heinz is unable to be with us.
If you all would stay standing.
[Witnesses sworn.]
Mr. Miller. Let the record show that they've answered in
the affirmative, and we'll proceed now to opening statements.
Dr. Bryant said she wanted to make sure that Dr. Ehrlich goes
first, and actually he was scheduled to go first. Dr. Ehrlich.
STATEMENTS OF EVERETT EHRLICH, U.S. CENSUS MONITORING BOARD;
AND BARBARA BRYANT, NATIONAL QUALITY RESEARCH CENTER, SCHOOL OF
BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION, UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN
Mr. Ehrlich. All right, then, although I concede, Dr.
Bryant, with a certain amount of modesty, he having been the
one person on earth who has managed the largest field research
project that our civilization has probably ever seen, and that
is the 1990 census. And for that reason, I, as you, Mr.
Chairman, am looking forward to hearing what it is she has to
say.
I appreciate the opportunity to be here, even on this very
short notice, Mr. Chairman. A written statement has been
provided to you. Let me say a few things in summary.
I think that we have talked fairly amply this morning about
the strengths and the weaknesses of the 1990 post-census
review, of the LUCA Program. I think that even if unorganized,
many of those facts are there.
There are several, though, that I think have escaped notice
and that I'd want to emphasize. One is that half of the success
of the post-census review in 1990, if we measure success by the
3 percent of the net or 2 percent of the gross undercount that
was tracked in that review, came from two places. It came from
Detroit and Cleveland.
And, Mr. Chairman, you know as well as I do why those
places accounted for half of the success. It's because they
were on the cuff of having less than 1 million people and,
therefore, qualifying for a different set of programs that
would have been of important fiscal consequence to them.
In fact, local census review wasn't an immensely successful
program. It gave those two municipalities an opportunity to
preserve resources that they thought were due them. I think
it's also the case that we heard this morning that one of the
problems with post-census review is that it's unfair to small
municipalities, and it generally requires resources.
I think that in the long term that Congress needs to
consider reforms such as moving toward standardizing local
address lists and providing localities with resources that
would allow them to participate in pre-census reviews,
boundaries and the master address file and the like.
But I don't think we want to put ourselves in a situation
where we give every locality--there are 39,000 of them--a free
shot at holding up the 2000 decennial. And that, sir, is what
your legislation risks doing. It does not specify a criteria
for this review. It simply says that the Secretary will stop
the music if one of those 39,000 municipalities has a beef, and
it will investigate that.
That can't be done. It seems unfair. And if one can
dissemble about the rights of local communities and talk about
how they all have to have that right, that won't work. It won't
work because you, the Congress, have specified a deadline by
which the census must be done.
Those of us who are my age and older in this room remember
the TV show ``Beat The Clock.'' In ``Beat The Clock,''
contestants were given a crazy stunt to do and a fixed number
of seconds in which to do it. The census is playing the most
compelling game of ``Beat The Clock'' that we've ever seen. The
Constitution tells them to go out and to account for each of
the 260 million odd Americans and to do so in a fixed number of
seconds.
What you're telling them to do, sir, is to not only do that
but to do it with one eye closed and one foot off the ground by
being prepared to stop the music for each of the 39,000
possible reviews without a predetermination of merit and
without regard for the fact that, with regard to time, the
number of seconds involved, we're at risk of putting 10 pounds
of potatoes into a 5-pound bag.
I'm concerned that the Census Bureau has not been asked to
respond to this proposal before this hearing. And I think that
if they had, we might have exchanged views about what activity
in the critical path you wish to get rid of in order to create
the time for this review because nothing, as an economist I can
tell you this, comes free in life.
In fact, if we're going to have this review, if we're going
to expand it to the 45 days I heard about this morning, then
something has to give. And finally, sir, I think that we have
reason to be frightened. When the Congress takes upon itself to
tell the Census Bureau not only what it wants to have happen in
the way of methodology, ignoring the consensus recommendations
of the statistical community, but how it wants to happen as
well, I think that that risks the appearance of the hand of
meddlesome big government. I know that in your legislative and
political career, you have been an enemy of that trend in our
society, and I encourage you to be an enemy of it now and to
allow that career staff to do the job as they see fit. Thank
you, sir.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Ehrlich follows:]
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Mr. Miller. Thank you.
Dr Bryant, welcome again. Nice to have you here. Thank you
for staying all day.
Ms. Bryant. Well, the reason that Everett had to precede me
was that I said this shows how you have lost power when you
once testified first, and now you're the last one on the fourth
panel.
I am Barbara Everett Bryant of the University of Michigan
Business School. I think I'm here today for history. This is
because I was Director of the Bureau of the Census from 1989 to
1993. This means I was the Director of the 1990 census, which
was not the largest census in civilization. China and India
have more.
Post-census local review in 1990 was a well-intentioned but
ineffective operation. And even before the 1990 census was
completed, there were consensus among those of us with
operational leadership responsibilities for that census. A
better way needed to be found to work cooperatively with local
units of government to improve the Census Bureau's address list
for the taking of the next census.
Now, I say the post-census local review was well
intentioned because cooperative was meant to be the operational
word. The review was intended to be a joint operation between
the then 39,198 functioning local government units and the
Census Board to improve the address list for each locality and
thus improve coverage and make the 1990 census more complete.
You've heard from all the previous people about the fact
that only a quarter of local government participated, that the
particular operation among a number of coverage improvement
operations we undertook that post-census local review added
only 0.08 percent. That's eight one-hundredths of 1 percent to
the number of housing units that had been counted prior to
post-census local review. That has been reported in table 1.2
in the final publication on coverage improvement programs.
Attached to this testimony, I further show by each State
that no State that did post-census local review produced more
than a fraction of 1 percent addition to the housing unit
count. The Census Bureau recanvassed blocks in which housing
units were reported missed by the local communities and had
already recanvassed others in other coverage improvement
operations.
Now, post-census local review in 1990 did have a positive
effect in identifying geo-coding mistakes. That is, housing
units that had been actually counted in one block but really
belonged in another block, usually the adjoining one.
One of the triumphs of the 1990 census was the first use of
a sophisticated computerized geo-coding and digital mapping
system known by its acronym, TIGER. Yes, the 1990 census had
some triumphs as well as errors.
Even triumphs, however, have problems when first
introduced. But fortunately, the geo-coding errors corrected as
a result of post-census local review then. And during the other
coverage improvement operations and in the years since are now
permanently incorporated in the TIGER system. And many of the
errors we've heard previous testifiers testifying about were
these geo-coding areas.
Well, rather than repeat the post-census local review with
its costly, disappointing and minuscule results, the Census
Bureau determined to find a better way for local government to
more fully participate in the census. Neither pre-census or
post-census local review worked effectively in 1990 for one
major reason, and we've heard about that from Representative
Sawyer already.
The Census Bureau at that time was not able to share
addresses with local government. Long held interpretation of
the Census law title 13 was that specific addresses were
confidential. And thus, for checking in either pre- or post-
census, we could only give a city or a county or a township the
housing unit count by block.
For example, you know, 30 housing units in a specific block
and a specific census track or 42 in another. Now, housing
units by block is not the format in which governments keep
their records. Tax records, utility records, all the kinds of
addresses that any of us are familiar with are things like
12342 Oak Street. And, the local governments found it either
cumbersome or impossible to compare records.
Interestingly, the U.S. Postal Service also had
confidentiality laws. And thus, the two largest address lists
maintained by the Federal Government could not be compared for
one to be used to improve the other.
Well, fortuitously, at that time, the predecessor of this
committee had oversight for both the Census Bureau and the
Postal Service. And with bipartisan support, Representative Tom
Sawyer whom we've heard from, the chair of that subcommittee,
and Representative Tom Petri of Wisconsin whom we've also heard
from this morning, who was the ranking minority member, worked
together and sponsored legislation that allowed the Census
Bureau to share with the Post Office and the Post Office to
share with the Census Bureau, and the Census Bureau to share
with local government for purposes only of improving address
lists, not for any enforcement purpose.
Well, freed from legal restrictions, the Census Bureau
moved ahead to plan the operation now called LUCA, and we've
heard enough about LUCA this morning that I don't need to go
through and elaborate on it.
We now have 45 percent, I understand, of local governments
participating. More are expected, and, of course, more are
desirable.
But what's different from 1990 is that as each local
government receives information, it receives its TIGER maps and
its portion of the census address files so that it can relate
those addresses to the maps. And for the first time, the Census
Bureau has retained the computerized address file from the
previous census. People may move, but fortunately most
buildings don't.
Now, the address control file is also being updated
continuously by the delivery sequence file of the U.S. Postal
Service. Since the Census Bureau is also the agency that
collects records on new housing starts and demolitions, these
two are being used to update the address control file. It's a
big job. You know if you've even tried to maintain your own
Christmas card list that our population is a moving target. But
fortunately, their housing units are a bit more stable.
All of this brings me to H.R. 472, which proposes to
reinstitute a costly operation that's been evaluated,
thoroughly evaluated and found wanting. Because the report card
on post-census local review showed such dismal results, it has
been replaced by LUCA.
Thus, the 2000 forms will be hand delivered to the most
current address list possible. But H.R. 472 does far more than
propose to reintroduce a census operation found ineffective.
More importantly, it details in great specificity how that
operation is to be executed. H.R. 472 thus opens the door to
many attempts to legislate micro management of the 2000 census.
Census 2000 is an operation whose scope and complexity is a
far too great magnitude to be executed successfully without
integrated implementation of a great many operations planned in
advance and tested in the dress rehearsal now past. The
decennial census is the largest Federal peace time activity. It
should not be designed ad hoc at the 11th hour and with just 1
year to go now and less once this legislation could possibly be
passed.
The 11th hour is now at hand.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Bryant follows:]
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Mr. Miller. Thank you, Dr. Bryant. One of our great
concerns is--and you've heard me say this is that I thought we
were moving toward a failed census. They've been planning for
an illegal sampling plan for over a couple years. This is, you
know, illegal. And back in the fall of 1997 in the Commerce
Justice bill, we mandated at least two tracks per pair or a
full enumeration census.
Last summer, the six Federal judges--two of them were
Clinton appointees--said it's illegal. And what do we have?
We're still going to go full speed for this illegal plan prior
to the Supreme Court rule, and we don't have a plan. We're a
year away. What are we supposed to do?
They give a plan that's got lots of voids in it. We have no
idea if they're going to do a PF, what size it is, or anything
else. There's so many missing things. Why should we know?
And they're saying, well, hopefully we'll get to you, maybe
next month. Well, you know, this is a $5 billion thing. I mean,
they haven't even given us the dollar amount. Now I talked to
Secretary Daley yesterday. He's hoping to have some numbers for
us by the end of February when he testified before the Commerce
Justice Committee.
But you know, we have a responsibility in oversight to make
sure we have a census. I'm concerned it's going to get done.
And then we have no input. It goes back to an issue of trust,
and, you know, you've got to trust this. This has got to be the
most distrusted administration in a long time, and, you know,
having the idea of them controlling it is a scary thing.
And then to say, as I say, we've been 6 years and spent $1
billion, and these are the experts that designed it. Well, the
experts have an illegal plan. So, where do we go from here.
It's illegal. The Supreme Court ruled.
Ms. Bryant. The Supreme Court ruled only in case of
apportionment. It actually encouraged the use of a sampling of
statistical estimation for other purposes.
But questions about the plan, I'm here for history.
Mr. Miller. Right.
Ms. Bryant. These are questions you've got to ask the new
Director because a census cannot be micro-managed by an ex-
Director.
Mr. Miller. That's right. But if we can't even get a plan
from the Bureau, if we can't even see the plan, and they've
been told in law that they have to have a plan, and we have no
details, that's not the details of the plan. How large are the
PES, and how long is a PS? Tell me that question. They don't
have it. They don't have any dollar amounts.
Mr. Ehrlich. What's material about that? You have to bear
in mind, Mr. Chairman, if I may for a second, that 90 percent
of the sample versus a non-sample census is the same set of
activities. The fact is their sampling didn't change the
approach to LUCA or to developing imaging equipment, to
outsourcing the management of the data captured facilities.
Which aspects of it are material to your concern?
The fact that the Bureau can't give you a number right now
for the final dollar cost of the census reflects not only the
kinds of concerns that you have, but, for example, that we
don't know what wage rate will clear the labor market to hire
the extra 300,000 people that have to be hired.
I think that there's a middle ground, and it's not clear to
me that the absence of the details that you raised justify the
kinds of micro-management that are of concern to us.
Mr. Miller. Well, we do know they don't want to do a post-
census local review, and that's the reason we're moving now on
this issue.
Mr. Ehrlich. Right.
Mr. Miller. As an issue of trust, I haven't met a local
official that's opposed to it. And I know it's a pain probably
for the people at the Census Bureau. I know they don't really
like to do this.
But the thing is, we didn't have trust. And if we don't
have trust in the system, then it makes the whole census a
failure if you don't have trust in the census numbers. And
that's the reason I think that this is so important. As I said,
I'd like to find an elected official to say I don't like it, I
won't do it, I won't participate in it. I'll bet you the mayor
of Chicago would participate in it if it's available, and I bet
you the mayor of Detroit will participate in it again if it's
available.
Let me go back to LUCA. You know, I think LUCA's a good
idea. I think we need to put more resources into the front end.
There's no question about that, and I fully support that.
But this is the first time they've done it. And you know, I
think you had a hearing out in Sacramento that there were some
concerns with it. We don't know LUCA is perfect, and they had
some problems there and hopefully they're going to correct the
problems based upon that.
And that's the only thing. You admit LUCA--and you're on
this monitoring board--that there's some problems with it,
right? I mean, we're all agreed that it's a good idea.
But, just as we liked the idea of the Florida census,
what's wrong with doing one after the census? I mean, we can
work out the time constraints.
Ms. Bryant. I'll point out one thing about it. It's local
government records versus Census Bureau records. As long as the
taxes are paid on a housing unit, the local government will
consider that a valid unit. Take an apartment building with 50
apartments, 49 of which are occupied and one of which is
vacant. The Census Bureau counts it as 49. The city, the taxes
are paid, counts for this as 50.
Thus, you're always going to have the local governments
coming back and saying you did not count enough. All of the
goodies come by maximizing your account, not by accuracy. As
Everett has said, when you open up and especially in 1990, we
had criteria for challenging at the block level, not at just
saying you're wrong about my whole city, but specifics so that
the Census Bureau could actually check them out on the ground.
This bill does not include any criteria. I think that you
should be working this out in discussion with the Bureau rather
than legislating a series of procedures that may or may not be
possible to integrate into the schedule.
Mr. Miller. Is Congress relevant in this issue at all
according to you, Dr. Bryant?
Ms. Bryant. Oh, yes.
Mr. Miller. OK, thank you. My time's up.
Ms. Bryant. We worked a lot with your predecessor
committee.
Mr. Miller. Do we have an oversight responsibility?
Ms. Bryant. You certainly do. Title 113 says so.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. Mr. Chairman, I know that
definitions are definitions, and different individuals need
different things. But when I look at this, it says ``United
States Census 2000, Census 2000 Operational Plan Using
Traditional Census Taking Methods.''
And so, when I hear a lot of conversation about there being
no plan, perhaps if that could be altered a bit to say I have
not seen the plan that I'm looking for or a plan that I'm
satisfied with. Perhaps, I could understand.
Mr. Miller. A partial plan.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. All right.
Mr. Miller. That's missing lots of details.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. And also, you know, I listen about
how much faith people have in this administration. And it was
just occurring to me that I know an awful lot of priests and
ministers who, if they could get a 70 percent approval rating,
they'd be pretty happy. They'd be pretty satisfied. And so, you
know, I think people do have faith and confidence in this
administration and in this government to take care of its
business.
But at any rate, a couple questions. Dr. Ehrlich, we've
heard that about 80,000 housing units were added during the
post-census review in 1990. Do you know how many of those were
vacant?
Mr. Ehrlich. If I remember it, I think something like 25
percent of them were vacant, 12 percent of them were reported
erroneously. So, maybe the number is a half of that or two-
thirds of that when the actual rubber meets the road. But
whether it's 80 or 50 or 100, maybe, it really doesn't get us
close to making the kinds of systemic corrections that need to
be made in the census in 1990 in which 10 million Americans
were closed out, 4 million undercounted on that basis.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. Well, if we were to even add, say,
56,000 or so additional units at a cost of about $10 million,
how would you view that in terms of cost-effectiveness?
Mr. Ehrlich. I wouldn't regard it as cost-effective. I'd
probably make three points in summary. First, if it had
produced a small increment in the undercount at a great expense
to a great delay in other important activities in the flow of
the census.
Second, it addresses one kind of error--undercount. It
doesn't address overcount, and there are overcounts. There are
people who have two different homes, snowbirds, they're
sometimes called out in the field, or people who have second
properties. It's impossible to identify that kind of an error
in this procedure.
And third and perhaps most important, there are two kinds
of undercounting errors in a census. One is where we don't know
where your front door is. The second is we find the front door,
but we don't know who's behind it. The second error, not
knowing who's behind the front door, is generally around two-
thirds of the error in the census, even more so in hard-to-
count communities.
What we have here is a minor solution to the problem of not
knowing where the front door is that gives us nothing in the
way of finding out who's behind it.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. I want to ask you, if you have an
overcount and an undercount, would you call that perhaps a
double whammy on hard-to-count communities?
Mr. Ehrlich. Yes.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. Would it act as twice----
Mr. Ehrlich. They're not countervailing errors. One doesn't
undo the other. In fact, when we have errors going up and down,
you have to add them, not subtract one from the other, to get
to the right answer or to figure out how far you are from the
right answer.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. And so that's quite severe?
Mr. Ehrlich. Yes.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. Dr. Bryant, I was just going to ask
you, you indicated when you get to taking a look at 472, in
your opinion, is it really needed? Are the same concerns that
we're trying to get at just as well gotten at with what we've
already got?
Ms. Bryant. I think that, no, with LUCA, it's much better
because it would get the addresses on the list ahead of time,
and, therefore, no, you'd get the accurate housing unit count
at the time you mail out the questionnaires. Post-census local
review inevitably would be done in late summer by which time
lots of people have moved, people with two households may be in
a different household, those kind of things.
So, I know there will be other kinds of followup checks. In
1990, we had a program called ``Were You Counted?'' And
actually most of what Detroit got was not from post-census
local review, but was from a very aggressive ``Were You
Counted,'' in which they distributed a lot of questionnaires
out. Many of the people had already been counted. But the ones
that put Detroit over its million were the ones who had not.
There will be a ``Were You Counted'' program again in this
census, as I understand it. I just think the post-census local
review for the time it takes--and I'm more concerned about the
time than the money--is not an effective program. And the
Census Bureau does learn by its mistakes. I'd be the last to
deny that it makes mistakes, or that we made them in 1990. I
think this is a case where you look at all the different things
you did, what worked and what didn't, and what needed to be
changed, and then go toward trying to get the address list in
good shape at the time that is the census period and when the
maximum publicity is on being counted.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. My last question, Chairman. If we
were to pass 472, do you think it could be implemented in time
to comply with the dates that have already been established?
Ms. Bryant. Well, the dates are by law, and they have to be
met whatever form you're in. And I do not want to get into the
operational plans for 2000. I'm not the Director, and I will
not micro-manage the next Director's census. So I'd rather
you'd be talking directly to Dr. Ken Prewitt or John Thompson,
who is the civil servant most high on the running of the
decennial list.
Mr. Ehrlich. Yes, Mr. Congressman, if I may respond in
part. I read in the draft of this bill that the Secretary shall
investigate all challenges timely submitted under paragraph
three, which is something that if you were to pass this bill,
you would want the Secretary to do? And that by November 1st,
he'll take whatever action involved.
This, in essence, gives 39,000 local governments standing
to sue to investigate it in the appropriate fashion, and it in
essence gives us a license to go to court. The census has spent
too much time in court and not enough time in the hands of the
career professionals of the Bureau. I think that we should take
every action possible to reverse that flow and not accelerate
it.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. Thank you both very much. I have no
further questions, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Miller. Mr. Doolittle, any questions?
Mr. Doolittle. I have no questions.
Mr. Miller. Mr. Davis.
Mr. Davis of Illinois. I have no more.
Mr. Miller. Mr. Souder.
Mr. Souder. I have none.
Mr. Miller. Let me conclude with just a statement that I
don't see what the harm is, and all we're talking about doing
is building trust in the American people and the communities.
And when you see communities like Congressman Petri's district
or Mayor Archer's city that it made a difference in real, why
not give people that opportunity, and that's all we're talking
about.
So, with that, let me thank you both for being here today.
I have a couple of statements here. Thank you very much. I ask
unanimous consent that all Members' and witnesses' written
opening statements be included in the record without objection.
So ordered.
I also ask unanimous consent that the record remain open
for 1 week for those invited witnesses who were unable to be
present at the hearing but wanted to submit written testimony.
Without objection, so ordered. And we will adjourn and
reconvene shortly for a mark up on the bill. Thank you very
much.
[Whereupon, at 2:40 p.m., the subcommittee proceeded to
other business.]
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