Federal Manager's Daily Report

Making more use of data from other federal agencies and from other sources could “finally play a significant role” in the 2020 census, decades after the idea first arose, GAO has said.

The Census Bureau estimates that it could save $1.4 billion in the next headcount by making greater use of existing records rather than relying solely on its traditional methods, an estimate GAO found reasonable given results of a recent test in Arizona.

That involved greater use of records to validate and update addresses rather than having to send workers to every housing unit in the test area. Similarly, the agency thinks it can reduce follow-up workloads by cross-matching the list of housing units for which no response to the census was received against lists of vacant units.

GAO added that carrying out such an initiative will “require detailed planning that includes milestones for ensuring outstanding challenges are addressed. This would include preventing disclosure of records and addressing concerns the public may have over their use, and obtaining access to remaining records. The Bureau has not set deadlines for deciding which records it will use and for which purposes, but doing so will help the Bureau complete needed activities on time and prioritize which activities—or records—to abandon if time and resources become a constraint.”