The American Community Survey: Challenges and
Opportunities for HUD (September 2002, 246 p.)
Since 1940 the Census Bureau has used two questionnaires
to collect data for the decennial census: (1) a "short
form" that counts the population and gathers basic information
and (2) a "long form" that obtains more detailed
demographic, housing, social, and economic information from
a sample of households.
Detailed information about households-their incomes, their
education, their employment, their housing-at the state, county,
city, and census tract level usually comes from the long form.
The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) uses
long-form information to determine program eligibility, allocate
funds, target program activities, assess client needs, and
evaluate client performance.
The Census Bureau has been planning to conduct a large national
survey of households, called the American Community Survey
(ACS), which would begin in 2003 and would be conducted every
year thereafter. The Census Bureau intends for the ACS to
serve the same purposes as the long form and to make the long
form unnecessary in future censuses. The continual nature
of the ACS is intended to provide more up-to-date information
in the future.
This report examines the challenges and opportunities that
the ACS presents for HUD. Taking into account the technical,
policy, and resource issues raised by the ACS, the document
contains three recommendations for how HUD can best integrate
the ACS into its ongoing operations:
- HUD should ensure that its managers are well informed
about the nature and timing of the ACS so that they can provide
their technical staff with the resources and guidance they
will need to move from the decennial long form to the ACS.
- HUD should ensure that certain key problems are
resolved early on to eliminate confusion and smooth adaptation
to ACS data.
- HUD should investigate options to take fuller advantage
of the opportunities offered by the ACS.
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