    [House Hearing, 106 Congress]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]

    OVERSIGHT OF THE 2000 CENSUS: A MIDTERM EVALUATION OF THE LOCAL UPDATE
                          OF CENSUS ADDRESSES PROGRAM

    =======================================================================

                                    HEARING

                                   before the

                           SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE CENSUS

                                     of the

                                  COMMITTEE ON
                               GOVERNMENT REFORM

                            HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                           ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS

                                 FIRST SESSION

                                   __________

                               SEPTEMBER 29, 1999

                                   __________

                               Serial No. 106-71

                                   __________

           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
    61-820 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                PATSY T. MINK, Hawaii
    THOMAS M. DAVIS, Virginia            CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York
    DAVID M. McINTOSH, Indiana           ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, Washington,
    MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana                  DC
    JOE SCARBOROUGH, Florida             CHAKA FATTAH, Pennsylvania
    STEVEN C. LaTOURETTE, Ohio           ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland
    MARSHALL ``MARK'' SANFORD, South     DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio
        Carolina                         ROD R. BLAGOJEVICH, Illinois
    BOB BARR, Georgia                    DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois
    DAN MILLER, Florida                  JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts
    ASA HUTCHINSON, Arkansas             JIM TURNER, Texas
    LEE TERRY, Nebraska                  THOMAS H. ALLEN, Maine
    JUDY BIGGERT, Illinois               HAROLD E. FORD, Jr., Tennessee
    GREG WALDEN, Oregon                  JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois
    DOUG OSE, California                             ------
    PAUL RYAN, Wisconsin                 BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont
    HELEN CHENOWETH, Idaho                   (Independent)
    DAVID VITTER, Louisiana

                          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
    THOMAS M. DAVIS, Virginia            CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York
    PAUL RYAN, Wisconsin                 DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois
    MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana              HAROLD E. FORD, Jr., Tennessee
    ------ ------

                                   Ex Officio

    DAN BURTON, Indiana                  HENRY A. WAXMAN, California
                       Thomas B. Hofeller, Staff Director
                   Esther Skelley, Professional Staff Member
                               Amy Althoff, Clerk
               David McMillen, Minority Professional Staff Member

                                C O N T E N T S

                                  ----------
                                                                       Page
    Hearing held on September 29, 1999...............................     1
    Statement of:
        Heinz, Jessica, Los Angeles City Attorney's Office; and
          Michel Lettre, assistant director, Maryland Office of
          Planning...................................................   109
        Maguire, Jack, planning/GIS manager for the county of
          Lexington, SC; George Pettit, assistant town manager of
          Gilbert, AZ; and Don Rychnowski, executive director of the
          Southern Tier West RP&D Board..............................    61
        Mihm, J. Christopher, Associate Director, Federal Management
          and Workforce Issues, U.S. General Accounting Office.......    35
        Prewitt, Kenneth, Director, Bureau of the Census, accompanied
          by John Thompson, Associate Director for Decennial Census,
          Bureau of the Census; and Preston Jay Waite, Assistant to
          the Associate Director for Decennial Census, Bureau of the
          Census.....................................................     9
    Letters, statements, et cetera, submitted for the record by:
        Davis, Hon. Danny K., a Representative in Congress from the
          State of Illinois, prepared statement of...................     8
        Heinz, Jessica, Los Angeles City Attorney's Office, prepared
          statement of...............................................   112
        Lettre, Michel, assistant director, Maryland Office of
          Planning, prepared statement of............................   125
        Maguire, Jack, planning/GIS manager for the county of
          Lexington, SC, prepared statement of.......................    64
        Maloney, Hon. Carolyn B., a Representative in Congress from
          the State of New York:
            Information concerning new construction program..........    91
            Letter dated February 9, 1999............................    27
            Prepared statement of....................................     6
        Mihm, J. Christopher, Associate Director, Federal Management
          and Workforce Issues, U.S. General Accounting Office,
          prepared statement of......................................    38
        Miller, Hon. Dan, a Representative in Congress from the State
          of Florida:
            Followup questions and responses.........................    97
            Prepared statement of....................................     3
        Pettit, George, assistant town manager of Gilbert, AZ,
          prepared statement of......................................    74
        Prewitt, Kenneth, Director, Bureau of the Census, prepared
          statement of...............................................    15
        Rychnowski, Don, executive director of the Southern Tier West
          RP&D Board, prepared statement of..........................    84

    OVERSIGHT OF THE 2000 CENSUS: A MIDTERM EVALUATION OF THE LOCAL UPDATE
                          OF CENSUS ADDRESSES PROGRAM

                                  ----------

                         WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 29, 1999

                      House of Representatives,
                            Subcommittee on the Census,
                                Committee on Government Reform,
                                                        Washington, DC.
        The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., in
    room 2247, Rayburn Building, Hon. Dan Miller (chairman of the
    subcommittee) presiding.
        Present: Representatives Maloney, Ryan, and Davis.
        Staff present: Thomas W. Brierton, deputy staff director;
    Jenifer M. Safavian, chief counsel; Timothy J. Maney, chief
    investigator; David Flaherty, senior data analyst; Erin
    Yeatman, press secretary; Esther Skelley, professional staff
    member; Jo Powers, assistant press secretary; Amy Althoff,
    clerk; Michelle Ash, minority counsel; David McMillen and Mark
    Stephenson, minority professional staff members; and Ellen
    Rayner, minority chief clerk.
        Mr. Miller. Since we have a quorum present with the two of
    us, we will proceed. We will start with an opening statement
    that I will present, and then Mrs. Maloney will have one, and
    then we will proceed to our first panel.
        As we begin this hearing today, please allow me to
    reiterate the very important goal that we all share, that we
    all want the most accurate census possible next year. As a
    result, we are here today to receive an interim update on the
    local update of census addresses [LUCA] for the 2000 census. We
    have heard glowing reports from the Census Bureau on the LUCA
    process and some mixed results and reports from out in the
    field. So, we're here today to see just how the process has
    been working. Please allow me to reiterate that this is an
    interim report. The LUCA report is ongoing, and this is in no
    way intended to be a final report of the process.
        The GAO findings that I will be referring to is a review of
    the city-style address portion of LUCA, or LUCA 1998. It is my
    understanding that the city-style addresses cover approximately
    80 percent of the Nation's homes. The LUCA program was designed
    to improve the accuracy of the decennial census by partnering
    the Census Bureau with local and tribal governments to review
    and correct the master address file. The master address file is
    an address list that identifies all housing units nationwide.
    It is really the building block for the census, and it is
    imperative that the address file be as complete and accurate as
    possible.
        In fact, in a 1995 report, the National Academy of Sciences
    asserts, ``Approximately one-half of the census undercount is
    attributable to missing housing units.'' The LUCA program was
    made possible by the Census Addresses List Improvement Act of
    1994, which for the first time ever authorized representatives
    from both local and tribal governments to review and correct
    census address files prior to census day. The Census Bureau has
    asked local governments to review address lists to help
    pinpoint individual and clusters of missing housing units,
    misallocations, or incorrectly displayed political boundaries.
    Who better to point out corrections than local officials who
    live and work in that area? I must say, that while I think LUCA
    is a great program and a vital part of the decennial census, I
    would be remiss if I said I believed LUCA alone replaces the
    need for post census local review. I believe that a review or
    quality check of the address list is essential before and after
    census day.
        We have heard previously that LUCA has garnered a very high
    participation rate. However, the GAO's finding on LUCA
    quantified the participation rate at 40 percent. I am somewhat
    perplexed with this discrepancy. I'm still concerned that if we
    rely solely on LUCA, the vast majorities of cities and towns
    not participating in LUCA will have no quality control at the
    local level.
        According to GAO's findings, the Census Bureau has received
    over 7.7 million suggested changes to the address file as a
    result of the LUCA 1998 process. Over 5 million of these
    suggestions were additions to the address file. These
    preliminary numbers are extraordinary to me.
        While checking the housing counts before the census through
    LUCA is worthwhile--I believe it pales in comparison to the
    quality check done after census day. And the more we can
    involve local government in the census, the better.
        With that being said, I look forward to an open and
    informative discussion today. It is my understanding that the
    Census Bureau is presently in the late stages of the LUCA
    program. We are honored to have Dr. Prewitt with us again here
    this week to report on how the LUCA program is working thus
    far. The GAO has conducted a survey on the ongoing process and
    we will hear their preliminary findings.
        In addition, we have several participants in the LUCA
    program who have traveled here from around the country to
    provide us with some firsthand insight into the process, and I
    look forward to hearing witnesses today. Mrs. Maloney.
        [The prepared statement of Hon. Dan Miller follows:]
        [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T1820.001

        [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T1820.002

        Mrs. Maloney. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am pleased that
    you have scheduled this hearing on the local update of census
    addresses program [LUCA]. The program is new for the 2000
    census and designed to correct some of the problems of the
    past. Even though the program is not yet completed and final
    results are not available, congressional oversight of LUCA is
    entirely appropriate.
        I also want to thank you for accommodating the wishes of
    the minority with regard to witnesses. I would like to mention
    and applaud the hard work of Representatives Thomas Sawyer and
    Thomas Petri, former members of the Census Subcommittee. After
    the 1990 census, they realized that one of its major
    deficiencies was the way in which local governments had the
    opportunity to review addresses in their jurisdictions. They
    worked together in a bipartisan manner to improve the process,
    and the result was Public Law 104-130, the Census Address List
    Improvement Act of 1994.
        I believe this program represents a tremendous improvement
    over the local review as it was conducted in 1990. LUCA is a
    partnership between the Census Bureau and local and tribal
    governments across the Nation. It marks the first time that
    these governments can review and update the address list of the
    census before the census is actually conducted. The hope is to
    produce a master address file which is substantially more
    complete than in the past by drawing on the expertise of local
    governments.
        The local review program, which occurred after the 1990
    census, was judged a failure by the Congress and outside
    experts. It only added 80,000 households, and half of those
    were in two cities, Detroit and Cleveland. Less than 25 percent
    of eligible governmental units participated. By contrast, the
    Census Bureau reports that to date, the new LUCA program has
    added well over 2 million addresses. In areas with city-style
    addresses, participation has more than doubled what it was in
    1990; 52 percent of all eligible governments, representing 85
    percent of the covered households, have participated.
        Mr. Chairman, I think this is a promising start. I am sure
    there are problems; there are bound to be in a program as large
    and as complex as LUCA. Those problems will need to be examined
    and addressed. I hope we can do that in the bipartisan manner
    in which the program was developed. Thank you very much. I look
    forward to the witnesses.
        [The prepared statement of Hon. Carolyn B. Maloney
    follows:]
    [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T1820.003

        Mr. Miller. Mr. Davis, do you have an opening statement?
        Mr. Davis. Well, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. As a
    matter of fact, I do. First of all, let me commend you for the
    number of these hearings that are being held and for the
    efforts that you are making to make sure that we provide the
    kind of oversight and have the kind of information that is
    necessary to understand what is going on with the Census Bureau
    and the taking of the census. So, I want to thank you for
    convening this hearing.
        And as census day rapidly approaches, I think, too, that it
    is important we continue to evaluate our plan to ensure we have
    the most accurate census in the history of our country. This
    partnership between the Census Bureau and local governments is
    one that is commendable. Tribal governments, especially,
    nationwide should lead to a vast improvement in accuracy and
    completeness of the address list for the 2000 census.
        This pre-census local review provides a real opportunity
    for local governments to get involved earlier in the process
    and to help improve the outcome of the 2000 census. In 1990,
    local and tribal government officials were allowed only 15 days
    to review the number of addresses in each census block. LUCA
    will provide 3 months for participants to review the address
    list and related maps.
        I'm also pleased that of the 16,030 eligible local and
    tribal governments, that 8,400 participated in the LUCA program
    for city-style addresses. This represented 52 percent of the
    eligible governmental units. Those governments included 85
    percent of the eligible housing units. There are also reports
    that of the over 30,000 governments in non-city-style areas,
    that 10,779 governments participated.
        I look forward to hearing the testimony of Dr. Prewitt with
    respect to some of the challenges and successes that we have
    encountered to date. In addition, I look forward to the
    testimony of other witnesses who will share with us today. So,
    I thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I look forward to this hearing.
        [The prepared statement of Hon. Danny K. Davis follows:]
        [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T1820.004

        Mr. Miller. Thank you. If I could ask the first panel to
    stand and raise your right hands if you would, please?
        [Witnesses sworn.]
        Mr. Miller. Thank you. And let the record acknowledge that
    the three witnesses have responded in the affirmative. And with
    that, Dr. Prewitt, it's a pleasure to have you here again, as I
    said, this week.

     STATEMENT OF KENNETH PREWITT, DIRECTOR, BUREAU OF THE CENSUS,
    ACCOMPANIED BY JOHN THOMPSON, ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR FOR DECENNIAL
    CENSUS, BUREAU OF THE CENSUS; AND PRESTON JAY WAITE, ASSISTANT
     TO THE ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR FOR DECENNIAL CENSUS, BUREAU OF THE
                                 CENSUS

        Dr. Prewitt. Chairman Miller, it is a particular pleasure
    to be here today. The last time we met, we obviously started
    the testimony by reiterating our concern about the continuing
    resolution. You produced for us, and we are really deeply
    appreciative of that. Had we gone into the next 2 or 3 weeks
    without the mark that has now been presented to the President,
    it would have been very difficult for the census, as you know.
    So, we are extremely pleased by the work that you did.
        Mr. Miller. I might note that, you know, if there is
    another CR needed, this is really for 4 weeks rather than 3
    weeks. Is that correct?
        Dr. Prewitt. Yes.
        Mr. Miller. But we have done as good a job as we could and,
    of course, everybody is working together on this, so I am glad.
    I appreciate those comments.
        Dr. Prewitt. And, it is a pleasure to talk to you today
    about the LUCA program. I am accompanied by John Thompson, the
    Associate Director for Decennial Census, and also Jay Waite,
    the Assistant Director for the Decennial Census. I will provide
    the oral testimony, and if there are technical questions, we
    may turn to them.
        Mr. Chairman, in your opening comments you commented that
    if we relied solely on LUCA, you would be concerned, and I
    appreciate that concern. The first, most important point to
    make is that LUCA is part of a multi-part process of
    interlocking, often overlapping programs designed to create our
    address file. An address file can be improved then from one of
    three sources, and to put LUCA in context, I want to just
    briefly reiterate that principle.
        When efforts to compile the address list for census 2000
    began in the early part of this decade, and they won't be
    completed until next year, fiscal year 1999 saw the completion
    of key steps in building the address list. In August, we
    completed preparation for the address label tape that now
    contains about 119 million addresses. The work of our local and
    tribal partners in LUCA contributed heavily to this
    accomplishment, but we also used the U.S. Postal Service and
    our own review and address listing operations. So, this is a
    three-tiered strategy, not a single-tiered strategy.
        It has been a massive complex job, it has involved
    developing and running nearly 1,300 individual computer
    programs, involving more than 530 million lines of code. The
    programs were designed to crate 440,000 large-format multicolor
    map sheets, nearly 10 million pages of address listings for
    review by local and tribal governments, more than 6.1 million
    smaller black and white map sheets, and 13 million pages of
    address lists for use by our field staff. So, it is large and
    complicated.
        I want to very quickly describe the major procedures in the
    two different regions--mailout/mailback and then in update/
    leave. To remind us all, what we call mailout/mailback focuses
    primarily on the 96 million housing units that have city-style
    addresses, where they get their mail from the post office.
    Examples of a city-style address would be 101 Main Street or
    310 Oak Street, Apartment A. These are mostly, but not
    exclusively, in major urban centers. In these areas we compile
    the address list and the Postal Service delivers the
    questionnaires.
        Since early in the decade, the Bureau has been working to
    find a way to improve the address list and to correct the
    deficiencies in the 1990 development process. Early is the key
    word. At this point in the last census, we had minimal input
    from the U.S. Postal Service and minimal to nonexistent input
    from the local and tribal governments in compiling our address
    list. For 2000, then, we have a completely different order of
    engagement already with these two other major partners.
        Working with the U.S. Postal Service has identified new
    streets that have been built since the 1990 census. We have
    added these streets and associated address information to our
    geographic data base, and we have updated the address list with
    new housing unit addresses built since the 1990 census.
        This process added approximately 7 million addresses to the
    base list that we had carried over from 1990. Then, of course,
    in addition to cooperation with the Postal Service, we have
    worked with our LUCA partners, and I will discuss that in more
    detail below. Members of the committee have already
    acknowledged, or noted, approximately half of the eligible
    governments, or about 8,400 have participated. Our current
    estimate is these jurisdictions represent 91 percent of all
    addresses in the mailout/mailback areas.
        In addition then to the Postal work and the LUCA work, we
    have conducted our own block canvassing operation. To ensure
    uniform quality and a complete census address list, regardless
    of LUCA participation, the Census Bureau field verified the
    entire mailout/mailback portion of the address list. This
    operation took place the first half of 1999 and identified
    additions, address corrections, and deletions to the address
    file.
        In my written testimony there is one attachment, a one very
    straightforward table, which I will refer to briefly at this
    moment. It illustrates the effect of LUCA and block canvassing
    on the address list for the mailout/mailback areas. You'll see
    at the top that the original master address file had addresses
    that number slightly over 90 million. That is after we had done
    the work with the Postal Service. If you go down to the bottom,
    you will see it is now 96 million, which means that the
    combination of LUCA, block canvassing, and address listing by
    the Bureau has added 6 million addresses. You also will see
    that under the additions, which initially numbered 11 million,
    that a large number of them came from both LUCA and block
    canvass. That is about 3 million. Block canvass alone found
    5\1/2\ million, and the LUCA process, as it has already been
    noted, found about 2 million independently, slightly more than
    2 million.
        However, an address list correction process also includes
    deletes. And as you look at the numbers there, you see that we
    found it necessary to delete as many as 5 million addresses.
    The vast majority of those were deleted through our block
    canvass operation, and then there is some conversion issues as
    well. But that gives you an overview--and I want to stress--an
    overview of the fact that we have had more than one operation
    going on in order to assure the best city-style address list
    that we can construct.
        Let me then quickly refer to the update/leave areas and how
    we have conducted those operations. That area includes about 24
    million housing units. They have many different kinds of
    addresses, mostly in small towns, rural areas, where address
    systems have less geographic structure. An address might be
    Rural Route 1, it might be a Postal Box number. In this area,
    as we have stressed before, census enumerators will deliver
    questionnaires to every housing unit on the list, and they will
    at the same time check for any missing addresses.
        In the update/leave area, the Census Bureau created the
    initial 2000 address list through a systematic field operation
    called address listing. Temporary Census Bureau staff visited
    every housing unit in their assignment areas to obtain, where
    possible, the occupant's name, mailing address, and telephone
    number. If a housing unit did not have a clearly posted
    address, the address lister recorded a location description. In
    all cases, the address lister also recorded the relevant census
    geographic codes to document the location of each housing unit
    and noted the housing unit's location on the Census Bureau map.
    The Census Bureau then keyed the addresses and related
    information to add it to the address list. This process listed
    approximately 24 million addresses.
        Then as we had done in the city-style areas, we turned to
    our local partners through the LUCA program and invited nearly
    30,000 local and tribal governments, entirely or partially
    covered by the address listing operation, to review the
    relevant portions of the census 2000 address list. And, it has
    been noted about 10,000 or 36 percent of those units have
    participated in the program. This represents about two-thirds
    of all addresses in the update/leave areas.
        Approximately 5,000 of the governments then returned
    corrected block counts and identification from about 114,000
    blocks. We have now rechecked our address list for those
    blocks, added the corrected information where appropriate
    through the master address file and, of course, we are now in
    the process of sending our results back to our LUCA partners.
        To complete the LUCA process, we provide to each of the
    participants that have sent in corrections our response to
    their suggestions. This is called final determination. They can
    use the results to decide whether they wish to appeal any
    address to the Central Address List Review Appeals Office that
    has been established by the Office of Management and Budget.
    Participants will have 30 days to review the list and file an
    appeal. By law, the appeals are all to be decided before the
    decennial census date in order to allow sufficient time to
    prepare and deliver questionnaires.
        In late 1999, the Census Bureau will also provide an
    opportunity for participating governments to review the list of
    special place addresses. As has been mentioned before to this
    committee, local and tribal governments with city-style
    addresses will also have an opportunity beginning in January to
    identify newly constructed housing units that we will need to
    visit to determine if they should be enumerated.
        We also will continue to update the address file with work
    from the U.S. Postal Service. We call these the refreshes from
    the USPS information. The last will be included in January
    2000, and the additional addresses from these refreshes will be
    delivered questionnaires.
        The process as described covered more than 99 percent of
    the housing units in the United States and Puerto Rico. In very
    remote areas, and areas with significant seasonal resident
    population, the Census Bureau will employ a list method of
    enumeration. That is a very quick overview.
        Mr. Chairman, I now will address the three specific issues
    listed in your letter of invitation. Your first question:
    illustrate the participation rates of eligible local
    governments in the LUCA program and explain the Census Bureau's
    definition of participation.
        We define as participating, those governments that received
    address materials for review and have not, to our knowledge,
    officially dropped out of the program. In order to receive
    materials for review, localities had to express an interest in
    participating and submit a signed pledge to maintain the
    confidentiality of the materials.
        A government jurisdiction could include both mailout/
    mailback and update/leave procedures, and thus could be invited
    to participate in both phases of the LUCA program. Based on
    this definitional construct, the overall participation rate was
    approximately 44 percent, and this did include 85 percent of
    the country's addresses. The participation rate differed for
    mailout/mailback areas. It was about 50 percent, and as I said
    before, it included 91 percent of those addresses. The rate for
    update/leave areas was about 36 percent and included about 67
    percent of the addresses.
        The second question, Mr. Chairman, was discuss the
    percentage of households in the United States that are covered
    by the LUCA program and explain some of the hazards to local
    governments for not participating. As I have already suggested,
    over 99 percent of the U.S. housing units are in areas covered
    by the LUCA program.
        With respect to the question of hazards, participating
    governments used their knowledge about local situations to help
    the Census Bureau improve the quality of the address list for
    their areas. Governments that did not participate in LUCA
    missed this opportunity to help ensure a complete and accurate
    address file, but as I have explained, LUCA is just one of
    several ways that we compile addresses.
        We realize that many local and tribal governments may not
    have the staff, resources, or expertise needed to participate
    in the LUCA program. And thus, we have taken steps where
    necessary to compensate for this. I have already mentioned the
    block canvassing. We added this to ensure uniform quality and a
    complete census 2000 address list regardless of LUCA
    participation. The Census Bureau determined in the summer of
    1997 that we needed to add a 100 percent field verification
    activity in areas with mostly city-style addresses. We believed
    this operation was needed to ensure address list completeness
    and quality.
        In the update/leave/mailback areas, census enumerators will
    conduct a 100 percent field canvass of addresses at the time
    they deliver questionnaires. And, we have significantly
    strengthened quality control procedure in this area. These
    efforts will help compensate for those areas that did not
    participate in the LUCA program. To be emphatic on this point,
    census 2000 includes a direct Census Bureau on-the-ground
    effort covering the entire United States, walking every city
    and town block and driving every rural road.
        Your third question, Mr. Chairman: please address the
    concerns of local governments regarding delays in returning the
    corrected address lists to the local governments for LUCA 1998.
    These are serious legitimate concerns. The Census Bureau
    experienced problems and delays with its initial plan. We then
    put in place a plan to correct these earlier problems and set
    for ourselves a more realistic schedule.
        We appreciate that changes to an announced program make it
    difficult for our partners who, themselves, must plan ahead in
    their use of staff and resources. Their frustration is
    understandable. Below I will explain how the new plan does try
    to compensate by reducing the operational burdens.
    Nevertheless, I want to emphasize that we believe these to be
    legitimate and serious concerns and that there were delays
    between what we had promised we would deliver and what we did
    deliver. The Census Bureau paid a price in a public relations
    setback with our partners. But we believe the design changes
    have improved the quality of the address list, which is the
    goal that we all share.
        That is, in exploring the issue of delay, I would like to
    draw a distinction between delay and the ultimate product, and
    the quality of the ultimate product. The Census Bureau has made
    every effort to inform local and tribal officials as soon as
    possible when program changes became necessary and to minimize
    the affect of those changes whenever possible. It is my belief
    that a significant majority of the local and tribal partners in
    the LUCA program have found the Census Bureau to be responsive
    to their concerns.
        Indeed, since I wrote these words, Mr. Chairman, I have had
    an opportunity to read the testimony the GAO will be presenting
    to you momentarily, and we note with some pleasure that on the
    key issue of the responsiveness, the quality, and the
    timeliness of the Census Bureau's response on LUCA, somewhere
    in the neighborhood of 10 to 15 percent of the jurisdictions
    expressed concerns, which is to say in the neighborhood of 85
    percent to 90 percent are reporting a very great or moderate
    degree of appreciation of the timeliness and the quality and
    responsiveness of the Census Bureau. We take some pleasure in
    the report of the GAO on that score.
        Indeed, I am pleased to report--I will not use glowing
    language, but despite the problems we have encountered, our
    local and tribal partners have been able to participate, those
    that wish to, in what we now think is a successful program. It
    is not a program without problems, but it is, in general, a
    quite successful program, I think, as the GAO report confirms.
    We encountered problems, but because we started early, we had
    time to make refinements and to correct the problems. Through
    our extensive outreach efforts, nearly twice as many local and
    tribal governments are participating in LUCA as participated in
    the 1990 program. And as we all now have said, these cover
    about 85 percent of all addresses.
        I earlier noted that we tried to reduce burden on our
    partners compared to the original design. To illustrate this,
    consider the issue of returning address corrections to the
    local and tribal officials. Under our original plan, the LUCA
    program would have had seven steps. Based on what we learned in
    dress rehearsal, the Census Bureau simplified and streamlined
    its plan. This change involved combining two steps, detailed
    feedback, with the step of final determination.
        Basically, this change means that we are simplifying the
    program for participants. We will provide them the information
    after we have verified, not just the disputed, all addresses
    provided by the participants that do not match the results of
    the block canvassing operation. It saves time in the schedule,
    because we do not need to produce, deliver, and ship detailed
    feedback materials separately from the final determination
    material. This means that we are able to start verifying
    addresses sooner because we will no longer have to wait for the
    reaction of the local and tribal governments.
        I should note--and this is an important point--we will mail
    questionnaires even to addresses that did not match to the
    block canvassing operation, but we will not conduct nonresponse
    followup to those addresses. We will conduct nonresponse
    followup only if the address has been verified. But all
    addresses will get the questionnaire.
        You have also heard about delays in our LUCA program for
    update/leave. As a result of these delays, we are forced to
    compress the review time that local and tribal governments had,
    but it is important to stress that even as we compressed the
    review time, we changed the procedure substantially. That is,
    in the update/leave areas, the local participants were
    initially expected to review on an address by address basis.
    But now in the new program, they only have to review at the
    level of housing unit counts at the block level, a
    fundamentally different set of responsibilities.
        So Mr. Chairman, in conclusion, I would like to emphasize
    that despite the problems that we have encountered--and they
    have been serious, and we apologize for them--we think that the
    LUCA program has contributed to the overall quality of the
    address list. But second, that it is only one thing leading to
    the quality of that address list. It is also our own on-the-
    ground work that matters, and it is also our work with the post
    office. I think that we do go into census 2000 with an address
    list that is a vastly improved product from the one that we
    used in 1990. Thank you.
        [The prepared statement of Dr. Prewitt follows:]
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        Mr. Miller. Thank you. Did Mr. Waite or Mr. Thompson have
    any statement? We are going to try to stick with the 5-minute
    rule, because we do have four panels today, and we want to make
    sure we have plenty of time. I know that a lesson we learned in
    1990 was the critical role of the address list and the
    inadequacies of that list. And in the 1994 legislation that
    Mrs. Maloney was referring to by Mr. Sawyer and Mr. Petri, the
    Bureau is working to move it along. Briefly, summarize the
    total improvements we have made in addressing this issue of
    1990. I mean, this whole LUCA program is part of it, but how
    much better are we off today than we were 10 years ago in 1989?
    I mean, very briefly.
        Dr. Prewitt. I think the best way to answer that is to
    simply say that in 1989, we, essentially, were working simply
    from a Postal address file. We never walked the streets. I am
    going to make sure we get it right. I wasn't there in 1989. Mr.
    Thompson was.
        Mr. Miller. Mr. Thompson.
        Mr. Thompson. In 1989, we had an address list for the urban
    areas that we purchased from a commercial vendor, and we had
    gone over the ground once, and we sent it to the post office on
    two occasions. We had not had at that time a thorough review by
    local governments of the list. In fact, we didn't have the
    legislation that we now have that would have allowed for an
    effective review. So basically, we sent a commercial list to
    the post office for several updates, and we had gone over the
    ground once with the list.
        Now, compare that to 2000, we have actually received and
    worked with the post office's address file all decade. We have
    been matching it to the 1990 address list. We have been
    improving our address list throughout the decade. We have been
    able to share our address list with local governments for them
    to review, and I think they have done that quite effectively,
    and we have also gone over the ground. So, I think we are
    considerably ahead of where we were in 1989.
        Mr. Miller. Do you have a number of the additional costs? I
    mean, I know we have put a lot more resources in it. We did
    some supplemental before your time, Dr. Prewitt, but
    supplementals to be able to do this master address list. Do you
    have an idea of the total cost of the master address list? And
    especially, even comparing it with 1990, because I think a lot
    of people are critical of the high cost of the census compared
    to 1990. And one of the costs is addressing. One of the major
    problems of 1990 is the address list.
        Dr. Prewitt. I could provide that information to the
    committee. It is not readily available to me right now.
        Mr. Miller. Well, I'd be interested in the additional cost.
    We know the significance. I think the supplemental one was $100
    million alone to do the list. Let me get clarification on this.
        I mean, one of the disappointments, I think, is the low
    participation by local governments. I wish there was more. You
    know, we hear back in our districts and around the country of
    local community leaders, how it is important and how they need
    to participate. And then, I guess we are getting a 40 percent
    participation rate, low 40's. So, that has to be disappointing.
    Is that disappointing to you, this participation rate?
    Especially for 2010, what we could do to even improve that?
        Dr. Prewitt. Well, the most important thing we can do for
    2010, of course, is to launch the American community survey,
    and you have already expressed your own support of that, I
    believe, because that is a constant updating of the address
    list in the entire country, which means we will never have to
    do this kind of just-in-time address file work again. Let us
    say, we hope we don't have to reproduce the 2000 experience in
    2010 if we have the American community survey in the field.
        However, to your point, it is very hard to judge. You know,
    I am sure some cities got this and took a look at it and said,
    ``Look, we have got a pretty clean little city here. There is
    no reason to think there is going to be any problem.''
    Therefore, they just set it aside. Some probably got it and
    said, ``I don't understand this, we don't have the resources,''
    and so forth, and set it aside. We have no way of knowing that.
        I think the fact that it is 85 percent of the addresses in
    the country is more important almost than its 40 percent. Our
    number is slightly higher because we define participation
    differently from the GAO. But whatever it is, whether it is 50
    or 40 percent, that it is 85 percent of the addresses suggest
    to us that the jurisdictions who had concern about their counts
    have participated and cooperated. We have talked about
    cooperation of the American public with the census before,
    which is just basic response rate.
        So, it is disappointing, but I think not fatal. If we did
    not have the other two procedures; that is, the block
    canvassing and the update/leave procedures, then we would be
    more concerned. But because we are also walking this ground
    ourselves, we think we can compensate for the absence.
        Mr. Miller. Let me come up with a couple numbers. Even
    though my time is up, I am going to stretch a little bit. The
    GAO had one table that was 16,600 jurisdictions--9,700 to 9,800
    agreed to participate, but only 5,800 sent back annotated
    material. And, that is where the 40 percent, I am assuming,
    comes from; but you are saying that 5,800 represents 85 percent
    of the addresses. So, it is mainly the large cities. The small
    towns are the ones that are failing to participate, I guess.
        Dr. Prewitt. Yes, by definition. Unfortunately, a smaller
    number of jurisdictions participated than the total number of
    addresses.
        Mr. Miller. Right.
        Dr. Prewitt. Mr. Chairman, the people who got the
    materials, and they did not send anything back to us, they may
    have looked at them and said fine. It is not an indication that
    there is a problem with the address list; it is quite the
    opposite. It might be an indication of satisfaction.
        Mr. Miller. You accepted 2.76 million changes. Is that
    approximately the right number? I am having to look at the GAO
    tables.
        Dr. Prewitt. In this table, you will see that the LUCA
    process added in the city-style areas 2.3 million addresses.
    Those are still going through our own review. They haven't been
    fully accepted yet. We don't imagine all of those will survive
    to the final address file.
        Mr. Miller. Oh, OK. Well, then there is still too many that
    are still under appeal and are going to be----
        Dr. Prewitt. Well, they are under review by us and then we
    send them back, our own judgment. Then, they can go into appeal
    if there is a difference of viewpoint.
        Mr. Miller. There is a significant amount of recommended
    changes from local governments. Some are valid and some aren't.
    One question you have is how many of these communities are
    missing. Could it be another 5 million changes and such? Well,
    Mrs. Maloney.
        Mrs. Maloney. OK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. For the record,
    I want to correct a statement in your opening remarks so that
    we have accurate information for this very important issue. The
    1995 National Academy of Science's report, Moderning the U.S.
    Census, did say that about half of the people missed in the
    census lived in housing units that were missed entirely.
        However, as you know, we both received a letter last year
    from the chairman of that panel, Dr. Charles Schultz,
    correcting that statement because full evaluations were not
    completed when the report was drafted. In fact, about two-
    thirds of the people missed in 1990 lived in housing units that
    were counted. Only one-third lived in housing units that were
    missed entirely. This was a vast improvement over 1980 in terms
    of completeness of the address list. I don't have the letter
    with me now, but I would like to submit it following the
    hearing for inclusion with the record.
        [The information referred to follows:]
        [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T1820.014

        Mr. Miller. Without objection.
        Mrs. Maloney. Dr. Prewitt, the chairman in his opening
    statement reiterated his support for post census local review.
    I just want to say that I continue to oppose this bill on this
    issue, along with many State and local officials, the U.S.
    Conference of Mayors, and many editorial boards across the
    country. Dr. Prewitt, 6 months ago, the Bureau was opposed to
    this bill. I assume you still are, but I would like to give you
    the opportunity to state your position.
        Dr. Prewitt. Well, I think for the reasons that the Census
    Bureau felt initially, that the post census local review would
    not be a major addition to our overall integrated census plan,
    we have the same position today that we had then when it was
    being discussed as legislation.
        Mrs. Maloney. Dr. Prewitt, in your testimony you mentioned
    that detailed feedback operation was combined with the final
    determination process. I know that some local governments
    viewed this as a lost opportunity to review the address list.
    Would you elaborate on why this isn't the case and why the
    final procedures are an improvement?
        Dr. Prewitt. Certainly. Could Mr. Waite address that,
    please?
        Mr. Waite. Yes. The original plan involved taking the
    addresses submitted by the community and matching them to what
    we had done with our block canvass. Any mismatches, we were
    going to be sending back to the community and saying, these we
    didn't find. If you would like us to check again, we will.
    Otherwise, we won't. That was the original plan. So the
    communities would have had a chance to look at the full 2
    million addresses that you see--2.3 million addresses on this
    list. They would have had to make a decision then whether to
    ask us to go back to verify them. And if they did, we would
    have gone back and verified them.
        The changed plan, basically, we just skipped that step and
    said we will go back and verify all 2.3 million whether the
    communities wanted us to go back, whether they were concerned
    about those addresses or not. So, instead of just doing those
    addressess that were questioned by the community, we are going
    back and doing the verification for the entire set of addresses
    that were initially submitted by the community but did not
    match to our work on our block canvass. We are matching
    everyone we would have done plus some additional ones that they
    may not have called us to go back on again. Every address is
    being verified. That is being done right now.
        Then after that, we give the communities the list and we
    tell them OK. Of the 2.3 million that we verified, we found
    these, we did not find these. They still have an opportunity at
    that point if they think that we didn't find all of the
    addresses to appeal those addresses that we didn't find.
        Mrs. Maloney. What lessons did the Bureau learn about LUCA
    from the census dress rehearsal, and to what extent were they
    incorporated for 2000?
        Dr. Prewitt. To go back to Mr. Miller's earlier comment,
    the most important thing we learned is we desperately needed a
    seriously reengineered address file strategy. When we were in
    South Carolina--also in Sacramento, but primarily in South
    Carolina--we were operating on the basis of a preengineered--
    pre-reengineered address file, and it had serious deficiencies.
        Now, we didn't learn that from the dress rehearsal; it only
    confirmed something we already suspected. But by far, the most
    important thing was that we could not have gone into 2000 with
    the address file that we had if we built it up from 1990 in the
    conventional process. We learned a lot of other things as well
    as a more specific sort, like some of the new kinds of
    development that are occurring in the non-city-style areas.
        Mrs. Maloney. My time is up. Just very briefly, the GAO
    study indicates that the LUCA program has had considerable
    success, but there remains room for improvement. What do you
    think should be done to improve the LUCA program?
        Dr. Prewitt. Well, with respect to the LUCA program for
    census 2000, there are certain things we will learn from this
    one if we do reproduce it for 2010, but I won't go into those
    lessons at this stage. I think the most important thing that we
    have to do in the remainder of the LUCA process for 2000 is we
    have to deliver what we say we are going to deliver when we say
    we are going to deliver it in a way that the local partners
    have an opportunity to then plan ahead and do their work.
        We think we are now on schedule doing that. I didn't bring
    in all of our complicated procedure schedules, but with respect
    to the LUCA stuff, the reconciliation is going to be on
    schedule, and we have a new construction step, and it is very
    important that we maintain schedule on that. We are fairly
    confident, barring unforeseen operational complications, that
    we will be able to sustain our current pledges.
        Mrs. Maloney. My time is up.
        Mr. Miller. Mr. Davis.
        Mr. Davis. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. If I could,
    you know, I was just sitting here thinking how great it is to
    live in a democracy where there are always options. And, I note
    that only about half of the local governments participated in
    the LUCA. What kind of information are we given as to why the
    other half pretty much chose not to participate?
        Dr. Prewitt. Mr. Davis, I am sorry. We don't know. I would
    like to know the answer to that question, and perhaps as GAO
    continues to do its study of the LUCA process, it could inquire
    into that. After the fact, we will try to find that out. In the
    process of actually doing it, we simply send the materials out.
    We send out the criteria----
        [Tape 1, side 2.]
        Dr. Prewitt [continuing]. Do you think it goes back to what
    was suggested in the earlier comments by the chairman and Mrs.
    Maloney, that because it represents such a small number of the
    addresses, it is by definition smaller units. So, part of it is
    their own absence of local resources. We were surprised. For
    example, we sent materials to areas that turned out not to have
    a computer so that we had to reformat it in such a way that
    they could process these materials in a completely
    nonelectronic environment. So, we are talking about a very
    mixed array of resources in our 39,000 jurisdictions.
        Mr. Davis. Haven't we also pretty much determined that it
    would be in their best interest to participate? If they don't
    have resources, in all likelihood, this might help them acquire
    some resources that they don't have or make them eligible for
    resources.
        Dr. Prewitt. I think if we had known before this program
    started what we know now, that the U.S. Congress, when it
    passed the 1994 legislation, might well have considered what we
    will do for those communities that don't have either personnel
    resources, geographic resources, or technical resources. Is
    there any way in which we can make sure that they have those
    resources. We simply did not build that into the design for----
        Mr. Davis. One of the things that always interest me when I
    am driving is that I sometimes pass through towns that say,
    welcome to Davisville, population 52.
        Dr. Prewitt. Right.
        Mr. Davis. And you know, I will look around, and it seems
    as though there are more than 52 people there. Did we get
    responses from those kind of towns?
        Dr. Prewitt. See, I think that is exactly the point, Mr.
    Davis. They would have gotten this packet of material or this
    invitation letter and this promise of packet material and so
    forth. And they said, what does that have to do with us here
    with our 52 people in our 19 housing units? So, some of the
    nonresponse clearly is attributable to the very smallness of
    some of our jurisdictions.
        Mr. Davis. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I have no
    other questions.
        Mr. Miller. Mr. Ford, questions?
        Mr. Ford. I don't really have any. It is always good to see
    the Director, and I sort of appreciate your willingness to come
    before this committee any and every time we invite you, sir.
    And I hope that at some point we let the guy go back and do his
    job. But at this time I would rather yield to Mrs. Maloney. I
    know she might have had some other questions.
        Mrs. Maloney. I will yield to Mr. Ryan.
        Mr. Ford. And if not, I would yield to my friend, Paul
    Ryan, from Wisconsin if he is ready.
        Mrs. Maloney. Thank you.
        Mr. Miller. Mr. Ryan, do you have a question?
        Mr. Ryan. Yes. Let me just ask you a quick question. What
    about the rural areas? My concern is that the participation
    rate with LUCA is a little lower with the rural areas than it
    has been with the cities, 36 percent, I think, versus half.
    What is it that we can do between now and the due date to beef
    up the rural areas? Are you doing something to try and get more
    local governments in the rural areas to participate?
        Dr. Prewitt. Mr. Ryan, the big safety net with respect to
    the rural areas is really in the process in which we are going
    to conduct enumeration, which is kind of update/leave, which is
    to say, we put somebody in a car, on a motorcycle, or in a
    rowboat, or whatever it takes, depending upon the conditions,
    to do every block. The entire country has been divided up into
    blocks, and these will now be assigned to someone. In the rural
    areas, someone will go to every one of those blocks, and they
    already have a map with all of the units listed on it, but they
    have got to redo that map, and they have got to add anything
    that they can find that an earlier process missed, whether it
    was a LUCA process or our own process.
        Because we are our own post office in the rural areas, we
    are not going to mail the things, we are going to deliver them
    ourselves. That process is equivalent to, as I say, a complete
    on-the-ground verification of every housing unit. Now, in
    addition, and I haven't put this on the record before, we allow
    our local offices and our regional offices a lot of flexibility
    with respect to once they are into the process how they want to
    consult with local leaders and say, ``Look, should we cross the
    creek and go down around the woods? Are there some new mobile
    units that didn't use to be there?'' So, there will be a lot of
    that informal back and forth with local jurisdictions during
    the process.
        Mr. Ryan. What about the governments that didn't
    participate, the 50 percent that didn't? Isn't it safe to
    assume that if they did participate, we could get a couple more
    million addresses onto the list? Is there any effort to try and
    get that participation up, to try and go after those who didn't
    send anything back?
        Dr. Prewitt. At this stage, there would be no way we could
    reinvite governments to participate and get their material in
    time to process it. That is why it is much more useful for them
    and for us to be on the ground and working informally with them
    than to try to put them now into some formal process where the
    deadline has passed.
        Mr. Ryan. The process you just described about finding
    people behind the woods and down the valley and improving the
    maps, you are talking about doing that during the enumeration,
    correct?
        Dr. Prewitt. Correct.
        Mr. Ryan. But obviously, it is a lot easier if they have
    good and more accurate maps prior to enumeration so they know
    that there is a valley there, that there are woods there, that
    they are going to the right place. What if that is not
    happening? What if they don't have a good map and maybe they
    don't learn about it?
        Don't you think that post census local review is the best
    catchall, stopgap measure to make sure that: (A) When they are
    enumerating, they don't have an accurate map, which in rural
    areas it looks like it is a higher likelihood of not having
    accurate maps; (B) If they still miss something when they are
    actually enumerating, why don't we get that local county
    executive/county board member to say, ``Hey, look, you missed
    that valley, you missed those woods,'' and give them a 60-day
    window to come back and correct it? What is wrong with that?
        Dr. Prewitt. Mr. Ryan, just before we get to that, the
    process I did not mention yet, or didn't stress, is that in the
    update/leave areas, in the rural areas, we have got people
    walking the roads and going across the creeks and so forth. We
    have a very extensive quality control process. That is, we are
    going to do a high sample of every one of those blocks--doing
    quality control of every enumerator. So, that a block could be
    walked twice; first by the enumerator, and then by a quality
    control person who is then going to say to us at the end of the
    day--``Aha, that person didn't do a very good job.'' Here is
    three units, or two units, that they missed.
        Mr. Ryan. And this quality control is going to be a local
    government official or a----
        Dr. Prewitt. No. He has got to be a Census Bureau person
    who has to be sworn by us--all the confidentiality. In fact, I
    happened to bring our manual for our update/leave areas, which
    is a quite interesting set of instructions, maps, and how you
    do all of this, and so forth. But it makes a major point that
    your work is going to be checked every day. So, it is an extra
    incentive, if you will, for complete coverage. Before we get to
    that, that is before the post census local review question.
        Mr. Ryan. One more thing--I see that I have run out of time
    here. The last time we were here, I asked you if you could send
    us the flight schedule of your media buys for your promotional
    materials. We haven't received that yet. Could we please have
    the flight schedule?
        Dr. Prewitt. Yes. The reason you haven't--we actually
    haven't----
        Mr. Ryan. You may not have it ready yet. I----
        Dr. Prewitt. No. We have a meeting this Friday with the
    Secretary of Commerce. We have to go over it with them first
    before we can release it, it turns out. But we are very close
    to being able to do that. We haven't forgotten that you did
    make that request.
        Mr. Ryan. OK.
        Mr. Ford. Can I just ask one followup question, Mr.
    Chairman? I know my dear friend was asking questions regarding
    how we are going to make sure we can reach all the rural areas,
    and even some of the urban areas, and how we ensure we follow
    with the governments that have not responded. I know the
    question might have been asked before I got here for my
    colleagues.
        Would you, based on what you know about 10 years ago, tell
    me where they were in terms of being prepared to get an
    accurate count. Are we better off based on objective data to
    the extent that you can be objective and not be biased. Are we
    better off today in terms of being prepared to get an accurate
    count than we were 10 years ago with LUCA? I know we had post
    census then, and if I am not mistaken, it was a bipartisan
    effort, Sawyer and Ridge, I guess the Governor now of
    Pennsylvania, pulled together to try to fix some of the
    problems they might have had, but would you say we are better
    off now in terms of being positioned to get an accurate count
    than we were 10 years ago?
        Dr. Prewitt. Congressman Ford, we really do believe we are
    by a wide, wide margin. At this time in the 1990 census, we had
    had no interaction to speak of with the local governments about
    the address file. And, we had not very thick interaction with
    the U.S. Postal Service. So, we have added two major
    components, if you will; that is, the LUCA program and our work
    with the Postal Service, to improve this address file. And I
    think the chart, which we did go over just before you were able
    to come, suggesting that we have gone from a base list just
    with the post office work of 90 million to now with our block
    canvassing and our LUCA program to 96 million, suggests that if
    there are that many addresses to have been added in the last
    year's work, that means that had we not done the work that we
    did, we would have gone into the census 6 million addresses
    short.
        Now, is that 6 million, is it really 6\1/2\, is it really
    5\1/2\? We won't know until we are out in the field. But, it is
    not the difference in six and zero. We added 6 million
    addresses, or there will be somewhere in that number added by
    these processes.
        Mr. Ryan. If my colleague will yield----
        Mr. Ford. Yes, sir.
        Mr. Ryan [continuing]. Just to add a statement, not really
    a question. I think LUCA is a bipartisan thing, but so was post
    census local review in 1990. That was bipartisan, as well. I
    believe that we should use every tool we have to try and
    improve enumeration. It is wonderful that we have added 6
    million addresses. That is great. We can add 6 million more. I
    mean, we already know that LUCA was by best estimates 50
    percent successful, meaning 50 percent returned to us, or
    something around that number. So, we know there are addresses
    we don't have out there. That is why I think on a bipartisan
    basis, post census local review in addition to LUCA is just
    giving us more tools to make it a more perfect enumeration. So
    with that, I yield back.
        Mr. Ford. It was bipartisan, too, not to explode these
    doggone spending caps that are about to explode, but I hear you
    and I agree with you wholeheartedly. I just know that post
    census local review was talked about pretty badly by a lot of
    the local folks, and I just want to applaud the LUCA efforts
    and, hopefully, we can work through whatever differences we
    have here, Mr. Director, in regard to the politics. But you
    keep doing the job you are doing, because it sounds like the
    results are coming back the way we want them to come back.
        Dr. Prewitt. Thank you.
        Mr. Ford. I must say, if there was post census local
    review--we did in 1990 add 84,000, not 6 million. There are not
    6 million addresses out there we haven't found yet. There may
    be some, but there is not anything like 6 million addresses
    that we haven't found.
        Mr. Ryan. And weren't half of those addresses in Detroit
    and Cleveland?
        Dr. Prewitt. Yes, that is true. Nowhere near Wisconsin or
    Tennessee, I might add. We want everyone to be counted.
        Mr. Miller. I have one additional question since the issue
    of post census local review came up during the question and
    answer. And it gets back to the question of trust. That is the
    reason I think we need to get as much local input and support
    as we can, you know. As you know, the GAO report refers to
    mixed results so far. That raises some questions of confidence
    in the whole census. And the whole idea of post census local
    review is to give local communities the idea that they are
    going to have a chance to catch mistakes at the last minute.
    And that is the reason a lot of small towns, the National
    Association of Towns and Townships, League of Cities, and
    organizations supported the idea of post census local review.
        The question I have is what happens after you complete the
    census, and you send out the numbers in March 2001, and a local
    community says, you missed this apartment building, you missed
    this new development? It happened in 1990. You missed these 300
    people? It is too late, the facts are over with? I mean, what
    happens at that stage when the numbers are out? It could have
    been a computer error. I mean, it is not nothing intentional.
    It is just that mistakes are going to be made. What recourse is
    there at that time, or is it just too late for that community?
        Dr. Prewitt. Mr. Chairman, the Census Bureau, during the
    discussion of the post census local review, reflected hard on
    that question, and recognized exactly the merit of what you are
    saying, that when the counts are finished and the city looks at
    it, it can say something went wrong. And it wasn't an address
    here or a housing unit there--it went wrong at a magnitude that
    we shouldn't have to live with. And the Census Bureau has
    designed something it calls post census count resolution, which
    would allow 39,000 jurisdictions the opportunity after the
    counts are finished to say that something went wrong in our
    community.
        We have designed that program. We believe in it. We believe
    it is exactly the kind of insurance policy that you are talking
    about. Should there be a magnitude of, you know, an apartment
    building simply got missed, or what have you, that post census
    count resolution would be worked out with State demographers,
    which know a lot about their State.
        All I can say is that we did design that. We discussed it
    informally with staff members on both sides of the aisle. We
    continue to believe in it. It is not currently part of our
    design, because we received no responsiveness from Congress
    yet, but we would be delighted to come back and----
        Mr. Miller. My understanding of that is that it did not
    involve the local official.
        Dr. Prewitt. Oh, it does.
        Mr. Miller. It was the State demographer that was in
    charge.
        Dr. Prewitt. But the State demographers are working with
    the jurisdictions in each of their States.
        Mr. Miller. But, it is after the fact though. It should be
    done later in the year, but in March 2001, they find a missing
    500 people--I mean, in a State that is very concerned about it,
    Wisconsin--you know, big States like New York, 500 people will
    not make a difference but----
        Dr. Prewitt. It is not----
        Mr. Miller. It is too late to do anything in March--I mean,
    once you know what the mistake is.
        Dr. Prewitt. No. The post census count resolution process
    includes a procedure by which we would then go back and correct
    the numbers for the intercessional estimate program for the
    next decade. So, it is not too late. It was a very serious
    recommendation.
        Mr. Miller. Mrs. Maloney.
        Mrs. Maloney. Well, we have been called for a vote. I will
    be very brief. I just would like to thank the panelists for
    their testimony. It appears that LUCA has gotten off to a very
    promising start. This was a program that was created in a
    bipartisan way and I hope in a bipartisan way we can continue
    to support the Census Bureau and the LUCA program as they go
    forward in their work to get an accurate count. Thank you very
    much, and we will see you in a little bit.
        Mr. Miller. We have two votes, and so we are going to have
    to stay over there for 15 minutes. We will take a recess for
    approximately 20 minutes. And, as soon as I come back, we will
    begin. And thank you all for being here. You all don't need to
    remain for the rest of it.
        Dr. Prewitt. Thank you very much.
        [Recess.]
        Mr. Miller. Mrs. Maloney is on her way back from the vote,
    but it is all right for us to proceed. So Mr. Mihm, first of
    all, if you would stand and raise your right hand?
        [Witness sworn.]
        Mr. Miller. Thank you. Please be seated. And welcome. I
    appreciate you being here with us today. With that, I would
    like to ask for your opening statement.

     STATEMENT OF J. CHRISTOPHER MIHM, ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR, FEDERAL
    MANAGEMENT AND WORKFORCE ISSUES, U.S. GENERAL ACCOUNTING OFFICE

        Mr. Mihm. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. It is a pleasure
    and an honor to appear before you today. In the interest of
    brevity, I will just take a few moments to hit the highlights
    of what is in my prepared statement.
        As you know, my statement focuses on two initial measures
    of how well LUCA is working. First, the Bureau's operational
    experiences with the first phase of LUCA, known as LUCA 1998;
    and second, local government's views of the adequacy of local
    resources to review the census address list and maps, and the
    quality of the Bureau's materials and assistance. As you
    mentioned in your opening statement, Mr. Chairman, LUCA 1998
    was targeted at jurisdictions with city-style addresses,
    containing about 80 percent of the Nation's housing units, or
    about 96 million households.
        On my first point, the Bureau's experiences with
    implementing LUCA: The Bureau invited about 16,700
    jurisdictions with city-style addresses to participate in LUCA
    1998. However, most did not provide the Bureau with any input,
    as shown in table 1 of my written statement. According to
    Bureau data, about 40 percent of the eligible governments
    signed a confidentiality agreement with the Bureau, received
    materials for review, and then ultimately provided material
    back to the Census Bureau.
        And that is really the key difference between our number
    and the Census Bureau's number. The Census Bureau is reporting
    the number of local governments that signed the confidentiality
    agreement and ultimately were sent material from the Bureau. We
    are reporting a subset of that; that is, the local governments
    that ultimately returned some input back to the Census Bureau.
        These 40 percent of the local governments suggested almost
    7\3/4\ million changes to the census address list, as shown in
    my written statement. Of these suggested changes, about 5.4
    million were additions to the census address list, and the
    Bureau has found about 2\3/4\ million of these suggested
    additions to have been valid. So those are already locked into
    the census. However, the Bureau has not, at this point,
    accepted about 2.2 million suggested additions. These are going
    to be rechecked during the field verification reconciliation
    operation that is ongoing.
        On the second topic I will discuss this morning, dealing
    with our survey of LUCA participants on their experiences, we
    looked at five things. First, the availability of local
    resources to review census materials. Second, the adequacy of
    LUCA timeframes from the perspective of local governments.
    Third, user friendliness of census address list and maps.
    Fourth, the adequacy of Bureau training and other support. And
    fifth, and finally, the overall completeness and accuracy of
    census address list and maps.
        My written statement provides details on our survey
    methodology and the results. Let me just touch on some of the
    major findings. First, LUCA appears to have stretched the
    resources of many local governments. About 44 percent of the
    local governments said that the human resources in their
    jurisdictions to do LUCA were not at all sufficient or were
    only sufficient to a small extent.
        In contrast, only about 23 percent of local governments
    reported that their human resources were sufficient to a great
    or very great extent. Clearly, local governments were having
    problems with the extent to which they had people to do LUCA.
        In regards to having the technology needed to review
    addresses, just over one-third of the local governments said
    that to a great or very great extent their technological
    resources were sufficient, while one-quarter reported that
    their resources were sufficient to a small or no extent at all.
        Second, about 38 percent of the local governments reported
    that the 3-months the Bureau gave them to review addresses was
    adequate to a very great or great extent, while about one-
    quarter said it was adequate to a small or no extent at all.
        Third, many local governments had positive views of the
    user-friendliness of census address lists and maps. We should
    note that this is an important development, because it appears
    to be quite a change from the experience during the dress
    rehearsal. Roughly half of the local government said that the
    Bureau's address lists were easy to work with to a great or
    very great extent, and about half reported the same for census
    maps.
        Fourth, in regards to training and other Bureau support,
    about 28 percent of local governments were to a great or very
    great extent satisfied with LUCA training, while about 13
    percent were satisfied to a small extent or none at all. The
    Bureau also made available a variety of resources that local
    governments could turn to for help in completing their reviews.
    It appears that the reference manuals were used more than any
    other source of information, and about 45 percent of the
    localities found the manuals to be of great use.
        Overall--and this is the finding that Director Prewitt
    referred to--overall, about half of the localities were
    satisfied to a great or very great extent with the Bureau's
    assistance. Half of the local governments reported similar
    levels of satisfaction with the timeliness of the Bureau's
    response to questions.
        Fifth, local governments gave the quality of the Bureau's
    address list and maps mixed reviews. For example, about 43
    percent of the governments said that they had few problems with
    the accuracy and the completeness of the address list, while
    about 18 percent reported encountering problems to a great or
    very great extent.
        In regards to the completeness and the accuracy of the
    Bureau maps, about half of the local governments said that they
    had problems to a small extent or not at all, compared to 16
    percent that said they had problems to a very great extent.
        Now, I realize that this has been a lot of information;
    there is a lot of data as a result of our survey. But in
    summary, Mr. Chairman, LUCA 1998 has had mixed results. On the
    one hand, many local governments said they were satisfied with
    specific aspects of the materials and the assistance that the
    Bureau provided to them. On the other hand, other components,
    such as training, received much less favorable reviews.
    Moreover, LUCA may have stretched the resources of local
    governments and the workload was greater than what most local
    governments had expected.
        Most important, as you mentioned in your opening statement,
    the real impact that LUCA had on the overall completeness and
    accuracy of the census address list is not known at this point
    and will not be known until evaluations are completed after the
    census--of the accuracy of the census address list. This
    concludes my statement. I would be pleased to respond to any
    questions that you may have, sir.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Mihm follows:]
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        Mr. Miller. Thank you. I appreciate the work that you and
    the GAO has been doing on different areas of the Bureau,
    because the GAO provides an independent evaluation on LUCA. And
    as everyone well knows, there is a certain amount of partisan
    interest in this issue. But we need to have the objectivity
    that the GAO provides, and we appreciate the work that you have
    done and other reports by the GAO.
        Let me try and get a better understanding. Now, in your
    summary of the 16,675 eligible jurisdictions, we ended up with
    40 percent that returned materials.
        Mr. Mihm. Yes, sir.
        Mr. Miller. The 40 percent is those that actually returned.
    A couple questions. Dr. Prewitt talked about 85 percent of
    addresses. Does that 40 percent that responded represent 85
    percent of the addresses or do we know?
        Mr. Mihm. The jurisdictions covered are about 85 percent of
    the addresses. What is not known is the extent to which the
    local governments reviewed those addresses. In other words, we
    know that some local governments only did a partial review.
    Some local governments just returned unannotated material to
    the census Bureau. Some of those probably looked at it and
    concluded everything was fine. Some of those may have gone
    ahead and looked at it and concluded we don't have time to
    examine this in detail.
        The other thing that is important to keep in mind is that
    we are still dealing with a large number of jurisdictions that
    are not reporting information, and some of them have been quite
    large.
        In fact, about over 2,000 of the jurisdictions that had
    populations greater than 10,000 in 1990 were not participants
    in either phase, because they chose not to participate in
    either phase of LUCA this time around. So, we are dealing still
    with some very large localities that did not participate in
    LUCA.
        Mr. Miller. Did you get any feel--and we didn't have time
    to ask some of the questions of the first panel, about why
    communities did not participate? I could maybe understand a
    community of, you know, 50 people, and it doesn't have a
    computer. But, do you have any sense of why the 60 percent did
    not participate?
        Mr. Mihm. Yes, we do. We have done studies going back over
    a decade or more looking at local government participation in
    census activities. We did a survey of local governments of
    nonparticipants in pre-census local review from the 1990 census
    and found that a major reason that they didn't participate was
    just a lack of resources and the lack of time on their part.
        During the dress rehearsal, we spoke pretty extensively
    with nonparticipants in the South Carolina area and, again,
    found that a major reason for a lack of participation was that
    local governments just simply did not have the resources,
    either the technological or the people, to be able to devote to
    reviewing addresses.
        Mr. Miller. You implicated that they recognized the
    importance of the census. I mean, a lot of communities look at
    it as an issue of money, both flowing from the State and
    Federal Government. You would think there would be a motivation
    to participate. Is it that these communities don't rate high
    enough on the scale of factors, or choices, or----
        Mr. Mihm. Obviously, local communities have to set their
    own priorities in terms of what they think is important and
    where they devote their resources, but one of the things that
    we have seen, and as we are looking toward the 2010 census,
    there needs to be more of an effort, thinking very early in the
    decade, of how do we work to build capacities within local
    governments to be able to review address lists and to have
    substantive input.
        In some cases, the local governments were clearly able to
    do that as suggested the 7\3/4\ million suggested changes. In
    other cases, they clearly do not have the capacities, and it is
    something that needs to be started earlier in the decade rather
    than waiting toward the end.
        Mr. Miller. The 5.38 million suggested additions, this
    comes on from 40 percent of the jurisdictions?
        Mr. Mihm. Yes, sir.
        Mr. Miller. That is a sample, obviously, not a random
    sample, of the 40 percent. We don't know how large a number of
    missed addresses would be out there, do we?
        Mr. Mihm. That is right. We don't know, of those that did
    not participate, even though as I mentioned a moment ago, that
    prior evidence suggests that a lot of the nonparticipation was
    because of a lack of resources, we still don't know how many
    didn't participate because they had confidence in the Census
    Bureau. We don't know how many got the census material, viewed
    it as OK, and did not send it back. We don't know how many
    really did partial reviews as opposed to complete reviews.
        That is why a lot of the questions about the success of
    LUCA--certainly, operationally, in terms of the support that
    the Bureau provided, local governments are generally pleased
    with LUCA. But the real impact is what difference does it make
    with the address list is something that has to wait until after
    the census when evaluations are completed.
        Mr. Miller. The 1.8 million admissions that were not
    submitted in time, that is a rather significant amount of
    submissions from the local community. But the 3-months, they
    said, was adequate time, but they still didn't meet the 3-month
    deadline. They miss the deadline and, yet most people felt they
    had enough time. I am confused by that one.
        Mr. Mihm. There are a couple things going on there. One is
    that local governments didn't have enough time, and to the
    Bureau's credit, we believe they didn't cut anyone off. They
    weren't overly dogmatic in saying, ``Well, you have had your 3
    months. We don't care if you have changes.''
        In addition, as Dr. Prewitt and his colleagues mentioned,
    there were some delays in the Bureau's efforts to get these
    address lists out to local governments, which meant some of the
    input from the local governments came in after block
    canvassing, after the Bureau was already in the field doing its
    initial 100 percent verification of the address list. And so,
    those addresses had to be picked up later.
        The important thing is that for these entire 1.8 million
    addresses, the Bureau has committed to doing another field
    verification to make sure that the housing units are there. And
    as Director Prewitt mentioned, the Bureau also is sending out
    questionnaires to these addresses. The addresses are in the
    data base so they will be getting questionnaires in the mail
    for census day.
        Mr. Miller. Your survey of the 150 jurisdictions did not
    count the 60 percent nonresponding, right; 40 percent of the
    jurisdictions responded----
        Mr. Mihm. Yes, sir.
        Mr. Miller. So, the sample is based on that 40 percent?
        Mr. Mihm. Basically, yes. It is based on those that were
    participating in LUCA as of January 1999. That is, they had
    signed confidentiality agreements and had been receiving
    materials, and had not indicated that they were going to drop
    out. We have not surveyed nonrespondents or nonparticipants.
        Mr. Miller. As far as knowing how many households or the
    percent of population that local communities had a chance to
    verify, we don't know that?
        Mr. Mihm. No, sir.
        Mr. Miller. OK. You know, the Bureau has done their 100
    percent check.
        Mr. Mihm. Right.
        Mr. MIller. But as far as the opportunity to verify, the
    big cities have pretty much participated?
        Mr. Mihm. As Director Prewitt mentioned, nonrespondents had
    a tendency to be the smaller jurisdictions. But the Bureau data
    that we have seen also suggests that there are a number of
    large cities that did not participate.
        For example, over 2,300 jurisdictions that in 1990 had
    populations of more than 10,000 people did not participate in
    either phase of LUCA; that is, the 1998 or the 1999 version.
    Seven of those had populations of over a million. And so you
    are dealing with some large jurisdictions that for whatever
    reason did not participate.
        Mr. Miller. Do we have any feeling as far as where the
    majority of these are?
        Mr. Mihm. Yes, sir.
        Mr. Miller. Where was the biggest problem in 1990? Is it
    the larger communities, the cities, or the smaller cities?
        Mr. Mihm. I know that data is available, I just don't
    recall it offhand, Mr. Chairman. And so with your permission, I
    would like to be able to research that and submit that for the
    record rather than give you something I would have to correct.
        Mr. Miller. OK. Thank you. Mrs. Maloney.
        Mrs. Maloney. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. In your July 1998
    testimony, you stated that the Census Bureau's revised approach
    to developing the 2000 address list was ``not without risk''.
    At that time you noted that the revised approach was not used
    during the dress rehearsal. Given the results of your survey
    and the preparation for this testimony, are you willing to say
    that the risks posed by the changes introduced in 1997 have
    been substantially outweighed by the improvements to the
    address list produced by block canvassing?
        Mr. Mihm. I can't go that far, ma'am, in that we still
    don't know the accuracy of the address list, and that is
    something nobody will know until after the census when
    evaluations have been done.
        Certainly, I can say that based on the discussions that we
    had with local governments during the dress rehearsal, and then
    the survey responses we got from participants in LUCA 1998, I
    think the Bureau should take some credit that a number of the
    concerns of local governments during dress rehearsal were
    raising about Bureau assistance and quality or useability of
    maps and address lists seem to have been substantially resolved
    by the time they did LUCA 1998. So, to that extent, the Bureau
    should take some pride.
        Mrs. Maloney. So, in essence, you are saying that you don't
    have sufficient information in your report to conclude that
    block canvassing has substantially contributed to the accuracy
    of the address list?
        Mr. Mihm. One of the problems is that none of us do, and
    that includes the Census Bureau. I mean, the evaluations that
    have to be done after the census will tell us the accuracy of
    the address list. Those have to wait until evaluations are done
    by the Census Bureau after the census.
        Mrs. Maloney. I must say, when I look at the charts
    provided in your testimony, my overall impression is that the
    local governments were generally satisfied with LUCA 1998. Is
    that your impression?
        Mr. Mihm. I think the key charts, figure 6, which is on
    page 11, clearly shows that high percentages of local
    governments were reporting to a great or very great extent that
    they were satisfied with the extent of the assistance, the
    timeliness of the assistance, and the responses provided by the
    Census Bureau.
        On the other hand, and this isn't surprising, this is why
    the Census Bureau did LUCA, a number of local governments also
    are reporting that they had questions and concerns about the
    accuracy of the address list and the maps. And again, that is
    exactly why the Bureau did LUCA. And so I would agree with
    Director Prewitt that the data in figure 6 is something that
    the Bureau should take some pride in.
        Mrs. Maloney. Well, based on your experience, and I know
    you have conducted many of these types of surveys, would
    numbers like the ones you report indicate that the program is
    basically on track?
        Mr. Mihm. Well, we looked at two operational types of
    issues: number of changes that were suggested and then kind of
    participant or measures. In terms of these being proxy
    measures, or how the process worked, then I think things are
    very favorable.
        I know I keep answering your original question in different
    ways, but in terms of the ultimate quality of LUCA and the
    contribution that LUCA makes to the improved address list,
    unfortunately, all of us have to wait on that until after the
    census, because then we will know what each operation
    contributed in terms of the improvement and the quality of the
    address list.
        Mrs. Maloney. Some critics of the Census Bureau's address
    list have suggested that the people walking the streets
    checking addresses may not be doing a very good job. In your
    experience working with those individuals, how would you rate
    the quality of effort put in census takers in developing and
    checking the address list?
        Mr. Mihm. The short answer is very high. We have been
    onsite, or went onsite, to a number of places with address
    listers in Paterson, NJ, and in Long Island, and elsewhere and
    we were across the board impressed with the quality of the
    address listers. An additional point to make is that it
    underscored for us how incredibly difficult it is to get an
    accurate address list. And we were continually impressed when
    census takers would know that they needed to go up right next
    to the door to check to see if there are two doorbells there.
    That tells them that there are two housing units. That wouldn't
    be evident if they were just walking the streets.
        So, a complete and accurate address list is an inherently
    difficult activity, and that was clearly underscored to us with
    our visits with census takers.
        Mrs. Maloney. The Bureau has reported that 52 percent of
    the eligible local governments participated in the LUCA
    program. You have testified to a somewhat smaller number, about
    40 percent of eligible jurisdictions, provided input to the
    Bureau. Can you explain this discrepancy?
        Mr. Mihm. Yes. It is just a difference in focus. The Bureau
    focuses on participation. We focus on input. Participation is
    local governments that signed a confidentiality agreement and
    then subsequently got material from the Census Bureau. We
    define input as local governments that signed a confidentiality
    agreement, got material from the Census Bureau, and then sent
    something back to the Census Bureau, either annotated
    corrections or even un-annotated corrections. And so input is a
    subset of participation.
        What we are all struggling with is how do we get--and this
    is what we touched on in the conversation with the chairman--
    how do we get a genuine feel for what the real level of
    participation was? Or rather how do we know how substantive the
    reviews were with the address list. Our focus on input just
    takes a bit of a finer cut than the Census Bureau's focus on
    participation does.
        Mrs. Maloney. Well, my time is up, so thank you very much.
        Mr. Miller. Mr. Mihm, thank you very much. I know you are
    going to be on top of this issue for the next couple of years,
    living and breathing the census, and we appreciate the ability
    to have the independent advice that we get from your agency.
    So, thank you very much for being here today.
        Mr. Mihm. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Mr. Miller. We will proceed with the next panel. We have
    three gentlemen with us today. If you will remain standing, the
    procedure under the Government Reform Committee is all
    witnesses get sworn in for hearings. So, if you would raise
    your right hands and repeat?
        [Witnesses sworn.]
        Mr. Miller. Let the record show that all answered in the
    affirmative. We welcome all three of you. You have all traveled
    some considerable distance to be here today. We appreciate it.
    It is very important to hear from people on the front lines.
    The two panels before you, they are the ones conducting the
    census. But you all are the ones that are, as I say, at the
    front line participating in this. And so I think it is
    important to hear from both the next two panels.
        So with that, we would like to have your opening
    statements. And let's see, Mr. Maguire, if you would like to go
    first.

    STATEMENTS OF JACK MAGUIRE, PLANNING/GIS MANAGER FOR THE COUNTY
      OF LEXINGTON, SC; GEORGE PETTIT, ASSISTANT TOWN MANAGER OF
      GILBERT, AZ; AND DON RYCHNOWSKI, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF THE
                     SOUTHERN TIER WEST RP&D BOARD

        Mr. Maguire. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am the planning/GIS
    director for Lexington County, SC. Prior to moving there in
    January, assuming that job, I worked for the State of South
    Carolina and was extremely active in the census dress
    rehearsal, working on five counties during that time.
        I would like to ask that my written testimony be entered
    into the record in its entirety, and I would like to summarize
    and make a few comments. Regarding LUCA, there are significant
    improvements over the dress rehearsal, and I commend the Bureau
    for the very important changes that they made. At the same
    time, the rhetoric about LUCA and their persuasiveness of the
    adequacy of the address list vastly outpaces the performance.
        The first thing that I want to say is that I don't think
    the Census Bureau has assigned an address in this Nation yet.
    Local governments do. If you build a house, if you install a
    mobile home, we assign the address. I personally do not think
    that the Census Bureau should be in the business of telling
    local governments what addresses it will accept in our
    jurisdiction. I think it is out of bounds when it does that.
        Second, regarding the field experience, it may be that in
    cities the Bureau does an excellent job determining how many
    housing units are in a block. In rural areas, I know from
    asking the people who have done the work, that it is incredibly
    spotty. They are concerned about their safety and they will not
    go off the road to see if this is a driveway or that is a
    driveway, and if there are 2 mobile homes down there or if
    there are there 22.
        In our LUCA 1999 experience, one of the most significant
    areas of missing addresses was in a place called Timberlake on
    Lake Murray. These are not areas to be concerned about safety.
    The smallest house that they missed in Timberlake has over
    2,000 square feet and sells for over $300,000, which in South
    Carolina is a lot of money to pay for a house. The largest
    house they missed exceeds 10,000 square feet, and I have no
    idea how much money that house would cost. This was after they
    completed their field work. They still missed 157 houses in
    that neighborhood. We verified it.
        Third, the Bureau made one major mistake that crippled
    local governments in working through LUCA. In the dress
    rehearsal, the address ranges were placed on the TIGER maps.
    That meant the person in the local municipality who had no GIS
    experience, no computerization in mapping experience, could
    analyze the maps and see if Aunt Sally lives here and Uncle
    George lives there. The Bureau chose to remove those address
    ranges and people have been confused in local governments
    unless they have a GIS system similar to ours. If we are to be
    partners in LUCA, we need that data.
        As to suggestions to improve LUCA, I think the first one is
    the Bureau needs to learn somehow, someway, that local
    governments assign road names, local governments assign
    addresses. The Bureau doesn't do that. If we tell them this is
    the name of a road and these are the addresses on it, they need
    to accept our authority. The post office accepts our authority.
    E-911 uses our data. Why can't the Bureau fall in line with
    everyone else in the Nation?
        Next, one of the major problems in the dress rehearsal that
    the Bureau had difficulty with was ZIP codes. They were using
    commercially contrived ZIP code maps. These maps gave improper
    addressing to forms that went out. This meant whole ZIP codes
    were missed. We offered at that time to give the Bureau proper
    ZIP code maps that were accurate and tested by the post office.
    Since then they have moved to a ZIP code tabulation area which
    is a very unspecific map of ZIP codes. In other words, this is
    ``sort of' where it is.
        In Lexington County, we have offered to give them a very
    precise map of exactly where the ZIP codes are, because we work
    out the ZIP code boundaries with the post office. We assign the
    addresses; they do the ZIP codes. We work with them every day.
    The Bureau has refused to accept our maps. The Bureau said, if
    you send them, we will let you send them, but we will not use
    them. We don't want that level of specificity. As a person
    involved in planning, I simply can urge someone somewhere to
    tell the Bureau to please use the most specific data available.
    We need this information for planning in the United States in
    the years to come.
        The third thing, please share the address list through the
    entire process. We want to see the address list that is used in
    the actual census. We have worked hard to do this. Many of us
    who are doing the list are doing a great deal of work after
    hours and on weekends. It is worth doing that kind of job. But
    if I am going to work that hard and that many hours, I want to
    see the results. I don't think that is too much to ask. We
    asked for it after the dress rehearsal, and we were told we
    could not have it.
        If you want local participation rates to go up, please
    update the annexation maps. The Census Bureau apparently
    believes that some maps should be updated for annexations and
    some should just get pushed aside. During the dress rehearsal I
    was asked if the town of Irmo had annexed anything in the last
    7 years. Irmo had been annexing every year. They resubmitted
    correct annexation maps. Now, the town of Irmo has gotten their
    latest maps, and they still have not been updated since 1990.
    It is no wonder the dress rehearsal shows the town of Irmo
    losing population in the dress rehearsal. If you don't update
    the boundaries, the population is going down, and that will
    hurt the cities for 10 years of funding.
        The other suggestion I would have is please update TIGER.
    TIGER has got to be strategically changed in the decade to
    come.
        [Tape 2, side 1.]
        Mr. Maquire. Local government maps are used 24 hours a day,
    7 days a week. Our maps have to be good. Please include us when
    changes are made.
        I sound frustrated because I am. At the same time, we would
    not have gotten here without the help of some of the people at
    the Bureau, the Charlotte Regional office, in particular. We
    would not have had the opportunities without the State of South
    Carolina Office of Research that allowed us to do five
    different counties in the dress rehearsal.
        I am particularly appreciative to be in the one county that
    has given the Census Bureau the worst experience. It isn't that
    I am glad that they are having a bad experience with Lexington
    County. I am just glad that if the experience was going to be
    that bad that I could be there to help fix it, because we are
    determined to count everybody at least once. Thank you.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Maguire follows:]
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        Mr. Miller. Mr. Maguire, thank you very much. Let me ask
    you before we go to Mr. Pettit. For the record, state where you
    are from and just give a 1-minute description of what your
    position is. You are from Lexington County, I know.
        Mr. Maguire. In Lexington County, I am the planning/GIS
    manager. We have a planning and development division. My team
    does all addressing, all maps, all subdivisions, and a lot of
    special projects.
        Mr. Miller. What is the population?
        Mr. Maguire. 200,000 and growing rapidly. We are one of the
    fastest growing counties in the Nation.
        Mr. Miller. You were in the dress rehearsal?
        Mr. Maguire. Yes.
        Mr. Miller. Thank you very much. Mr. Pettit, again, if you
    would just describe a little bit about what your position is
    and the area that you are most familiar with so that we have an
    idea.
        Mr. Pettit. Certainly.
        Mr. Miller. Thank you.
        Mr. Pettit. Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, my name
    is George Pettit. I have been the assistant town manger for the
    town of Gilbert, AZ since July 1985. When I arrived in Gilbert,
    AZ, we just completed a special census under contract with the
    Census Bureau that established our population as 12,102 souls.
    As I sit here today and we try to prepare for census 2000, we
    anticipate that number will be 105,000.
        Our concern is that the base data used by the Census Bureau
    was 29,872 people only 9 years ago. We have updated that
    information through a special contract with the Census Bureau
    to get to the 59,338 that were certified in 1995. Our dilemma
    is that the special census information was not even used to
    update the base information used by the Census Bureau. Again,
    we slid back to 1990 and our population of 29,872.
        In addition to my position with the town of Gilbert, I also
    have the privilege of serving as chairman of the MAG, Maricopa
    Association of Governments, regional population technical
    advisory committee. This is a working group of the association
    of governments which represents 24 local governments, the
    county, two Indian tribes, and the State Department of
    Transportation in a planning effort on regional issues. MAG
    POPTAC was designated as the contact point for census 2000. We
    have invited, and we continue to include, local office
    personnel in all of our monthly meetings and try to keep
    updated on census 2000 as best as we can.
        I think, as I tried to allude to earlier, Maricopa County
    and all of the communities within Maricopa County are really
    sensitive to the issue of conducting an accurate census count.
    There is a reason we contract every 5 years with the Census
    Bureau to try to figure out what is happening with our
    population. The rate of change is phenomenal. I can appreciate
    the change that you are going through. We have been
    experiencing it for 15 years and it gets a little old. When I
    started this job, I was a handsome young man.
        It was with a sense of relief and a great deal of
    anticipation that we actually heard early presentations to the
    City Manager's Association in 1997 that LUCA 1997--or LUCA 1998
    was coming forward, and it represented an opportunity for a
    partnership, an information partnership, between the local
    governments that assign addresses, create all of this
    information, understand our community and the Census Bureau.
    The unique thing over the 1990 census was that it gave us an
    opportunity to participate in the process before. We viewed it
    as a major improvement over the previous efforts of post census
    review in trying to track down all the citizens.
        Further, from Gilbert's perspective in LUCA, as we
    understood the maps, we thought we had an increased benefit
    because we were totally within the mailback/mailout area. So,
    we felt that if we could dedicate resources to identify the
    addresses, to get the geography correct, we had a pretty good
    chance of getting a complete count.
        You can imagine our surprise, I think, when after we had
    hired people in September 1997, and we were waiting for the
    information to show up, it started to show up piecemeal in the
    fall of 1998. But we found out that, basically, 25 percent of
    the housing units that we thought should be present in the
    community in 1997 were missing from the LUCA 1998 file; 10,000
    units is a fairly significant number of people for Gilbert,
    that is about a 30,000 population.
        Several streets were omitted from the TIGER file, addresses
    were missing and, in fact, the addresses that were missing were
    not only those that were new construction. They were addresses
    that should have been in the 1990 base file for apartment
    complexes and single family dwellings built and finished in
    1998 and 1989. It was our understanding it was supposed to be
    on the file; they were not.
        We reviewed and reported the LUCA 1998 geographic data
    discrepancies to the Denver regional office, kept our staff on
    board and anticipated a response as we were promised. In the
    summer of 1999, we still hadn't received that information back.
    We did receive notice in May 1999 that the detailed feedback
    option that we had so been looking forward to and hoping to use
    as a test to find out how our information was being received by
    the Census Bureau, that the process was being consolidated into
    a later process that will hopefully come to fruition in the
    summer of 1999.
        Our latest information from a meeting 2 weeks ago of the
    MAG POPTAC is that we might be getting this information in
    November or December. We still do not have a full understanding
    of what information the Census Bureau is using as they hire
    people and send them out into the field to do field checks. We
    have not had an opportunity to look at that. Their own
    personnel don't even know what they are really looking for, and
    they are just starting the hiring process now.
        It is a frustrating point for us as well, because we have
    also been verbally advised that we are going to receive a
    letter about new construction. New construction is obviously
    important since we are finishing 275 single family homes a
    month in Gilbert. Not only are the new construction programs
    only designed to deal with the period of January through March
    2000, there still is an unanswered question of what is going to
    happen with all those housing units that have been finished in
    the last calendar year, because the information we submitted
    was based upon December 1998 addresses.
        The GAO report that I had an opportunity to look at earlier
    today indicates that there is an obligation to complete this
    task for LUCA by January 14, 2000. If you do the math and back
    off a 30-day appeal process, do something about Thanksgiving,
    about Christmas, consider what local governments may or may not
    have to deal with when it comes to the millennium issues, Y2K,
    it is going to be a challenging time for us, and we have not
    yet really had the Census Bureau take advantage of the
    resources that we have invested in in terms of additional time
    and personnel.
        The need for a good count is extremely important to us.
    Thirty-six percent of our general fund revenue comes from the
    per capita counts; that is, police, fire, parks and recreation.
    That is $1,000 a head to the town of Gilbert. Every person
    counts in Gilbert to the tune of $1,000 a head in just the
    State share of revenue alone, let alone the issues of equal
    representation, distribution of Federal revenues and
    demographic statistics that business and parks use.
        Just this past week, I received a phone call from someone
    asking what kind of business opportunities there were in
    Gilbert, AZ with this population of 30,000. He was disappointed
    to find out that we were 105,000.
        The town is committed, Maricopa County is committed, all
    the communities in the region are committed to a full count and
    to try to work this information partnership that was presented
    back in 1997.
        Unfortunately, our investment has yet to be realized and we
    have yet to realize much feedback from the Census Bureau about
    our efforts in working with them. It was shared 2 months ago,
    that as they went out and did a field check in the update/leave
    area, that they had rented four-wheel drive vehicles and went
    out and drove up riverbottom to find a residence that was
    reported in 1990 that doesn't exist anymore. The county knew
    this information from aerial photography. The answer could have
    been easily provided if we worked this information partnership
    as it was presented early back in 1997.
        Again, a call to local officials can resolve a lot of these
    discrepancies. We had hoped that this information partnership
    would minimize the training problems that the Census Bureau was
    going to experience as they worked in a high growth area like
    the Phoenix Metropolitan area. To date, those offers have not
    been accepted, and we are 184 days from completing that task.
        I recognize that it is somewhat controversial, but without
    outstanding significant improvement, and meeting the promised
    deadlines, and working with us as true information partners,
    there needs to be an immediate assurance and an adequate
    opportunity for us to be able to review post-census information
    and those counts prior to certification in December. Thank you
    for this opportunity.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Pettit follows:]
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        Mr. Miller. Thank you, Mr. Pettit. And now, we would have
    Mr. Rychnowski. Thank you very much for coming.
        Mr. Rychnowski. Mr. Chairman and members of the
    subcommittee, thank you for allowing me to testify today on our
    experiences of the LUCA process. My name is Donald Rychnowski.
    I am the executive director of the Southern Tier West Regional
    Planning and Development Board. Primarily rural in nature,
    Southern Tier West serves three large counties in southwestern
    New York, over 130 local and municipal governments, and three
    Native American Indian reservations.
        Throughout the years we have developed a very respectable
    rapport with the local governments in the Seneca Nation of
    Indians in our region. I am here today to testify on our
    specific experiences with the census and specifically, through
    the LUCA process.
        During the LUCA process, Southern Tier West was made aware
    of many problems that arose with the program. Because of our
    rapport with our local governments, we offered assistance in
    the process. We hosted training sessions and visited
    communities to provide our expertise and experience to them.
    This was all done in an effort to develop a perfect address
    list for our region. We are confident that our efforts greatly
    improved the response rate by municipalities in our region.
    However, the Census Bureau often stymied these efforts, and the
    region fell way short of its goal of a perfect address list.
        We provided training facilities to the Census Bureau on two
    separate occasions for a total of four classes, absorbing all
    of the costs necessary in terms of the training. Southern Tier
    West advertised these training sessions to the municipalities
    and these classes were nearly a disaster for several reasons.
        First, on both occasions, the representative sent by the
    Bureau to teach the class had never taught a LUCA class before.
    When questioning them personally, they complained that they had
    little training, and in both cases were hired for a completely
    different job.
        Second, even though the Bureau was given a count of the
    attendees by us, the instructors always had too few of the
    materials to supply the class with. The materials were designed
    to be a reference to use throughout the process. Less than half
    of our participating communities ever received these materials
    despite promises by the Bureau to forward these additional
    materials at a later date.
        Finally, the training structure often left the
    municipalities out in the cold. Without the training session,
    it was difficult, at best, to participate in the local process.
    After several municipalities complained that they were not
    given a fair chance to participate, the Bureau informed
    Southern Tier West that a training video was now available, but
    the availability of this video was too late in the LUCA
    process.
        This leads to the next shortcoming of the LUCA process;
    simply put, timing. The LUCA waves coincided with the worst
    time of the year for local officials in our region; that is,
    budget preparation and tax collection season. When
    municipalities informed us of the need for an extension, we
    contacted the Bureau. The Bureau stated that no extensions
    would be made. A municipality could submit their address list
    late, and those may or may not be accepted. This alone greatly
    reduced the LUCA participation in our region.
        A community in our region approached the Bureau with what
    they said was a perfect address list from their E-911 system.
    The Bureau refused the list and said they would have to go
    through the same process. Other municipalities also had
    accurate mailing lists. These municipalities were less willing
    to participate in the process.
        A final example of the shortcoming involved the town of
    Olean in our region. The Olean address list was split in two
    phases of LUCA. This meant that Olean had to participate in
    LUCA twice; however, there was an election year between the two
    phases, which further complicated the scenario. The new
    administration came in and decided to participate in the LUCA
    process.
        To this point, the town did not know that they had been
    split into two phases. Our office received a call from the town
    supervisor. The LUCA deadline was growing very near and they
    were having problems. The staff traveled to Olean to find the
    address list with two addresses on it. The Bureau was
    immediately contacted, and at that point it was discovered that
    the town had been split in two phases. The first phase
    contained several thousand addresses, where the second
    contained just two.
        The town officials asked to complete all the addresses in
    the second phase. The Bureau refused. The town offered to work
    directly with the Bureau representative to improve the list.
    Again, the Bureau refused. The town then offered to accompany
    an enumerator through the town when they did their
    verification. The Bureau rudely informed them that the town had
    their chance and it had passed.
        As we reflect on the experiences of the LUCA process for
    the 2000 census, it is imperative to plan for the 2010 census.
    In a way, it deals with the issues we face today. The LUCA
    process was designed to be the single most important aspect of
    the 2000 census. The problem with placing this much importance
    on LUCA is that it relies on municipal participation.
        The accuracy of the census comes down to a part-time
    municipal official in rural areas that knows little about the
    census process and have really had no time to learn about it.
    The inflexibility of the Census Bureau needs to be rethought.
    The weight placed on local governments and no compensation for
    their efforts needs to be rethought. The lack of input from
    regional councils, from local governments, and rural America,
    in general, needs to be rethought.
        The Census Bureau has been stern in its message there will
    be no post census review process after this count. We have
    demonstrated that problems exist with the LUCA process.
    Failures in the Census Bureau and on the part of the municipal
    governments have resulted in a less than desirable product.
        Some States, including New York, recognized the issues that
    LUCA and the lack of a post census review create and provide
    State funds to the regional councils to carry out various
    programs. These efforts are aimed at rectifying the problems
    caused through the LUCA process. These efforts will help, but
    they will not solve all the problems that may lead to an
    inaccurate count.
        The most obvious way the Bureau could have increased the
    participation in LUCA would be to listen to the concerns of
    other local governments and the regional councils. We are aware
    of the importance of an accurate census. The lack of assistance
    to anyone for pre-census activities like LUCA and the
    elimination of the post census review process causes great
    concern for many.
        I am sure you can see how these problems may adversely
    affect our region and result in political, economic, and social
    hardships if we are undercounted. On behalf of Southern Tier
    West Region, I thank you for allowing me this opportunity to
    express our thoughts.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Rychnowski follows:]
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        Mr. Miller. Thank you very much. All of your statements
    will be put in the record. I appreciate receiving them in a
    timely manner, that we had a chance to review them ourselves.
    Thank you.
        Let me first start with a question for Mr. Maguire. You
    made a statement that was confusing to me. The Bureau can't
    give an address. It seems obvious to me. The local community
    does that. But explain to me why you make that statement.
        Mr. Maguire. The reason I make that statement is they say
    that they will give the final determination on addresses. They
    don't even know the addresses. They are using 1990 addresses as
    the basis for this census.
        We don't use 1990 addresses, Mr. Chairman. We use current
    addresses. We still have much of what was there in 1990, but we
    have changed a lot of that. We have had road name changes, we
    have readdressed roads. The Bureau seems to think that they are
    the authority on our county's addresses and every other
    county's addresses and municipal addresses, and they are not.
        Mr. Miller. Do either of you have a comment about that or
    not?
        Mr. Pettit. I just concur. We provide the information to
    the post office. We are legally responsible for the addressing.
    We know when a housing unit is completed or what type of
    construction occurs on the lot, and I think that is what
    excited us the most about this opportunity as it was initially
    presented. It entailed coming to the source to get the
    information rather than us having to justify it and prove it
    after the fact. Unfortunately, that mind-set has not improved.
        Mr. Miller. Were any of you involved in the 1990 census--
    directly involved, besides filling out the form?
        Mr. Pettit. Do you mean professionally?
        Mr. Miller. Professionally, yes, in your professional
    position. I think we would agree there is much more effort by
    the Bureau to be involved at this early stage, and I think you
    have had the frustrations, but you are all appreciative of the
    effort, and we all recognize the massive undertaking this is.
        One thing this hearing found is that only 40 percent of
    jurisdictions/communities are participating or at least
    responded. Even though a large percentage of the population
    participated, a lot of small towns, and villages, and such,
    apparently did not. Why do you think so? I know it is just
    anecdotal, but you deal with your peers and professionals in
    other communities. Why are communities not participating? Do
    you have some insight to that, Mr. Maguire?
        Mr. Maguire. I would be glad to comment from my experience
    working for the State of South Carolina. I called over 100
    municipalities and counties asking them to participate in LUCA
    last year when they were to sign up. It was amazing the number
    that had the document, but didn't know that was what it was,
    because the letter was that poorly presented.
        It always starts off, ``Dear Local Official.'' Now, I am
    sure those of you in Congress get letters that are very polite,
    always use your name, and you always read them. But if you
    happen to get any mailing that comes out, Dear Official, I
    don't know that you read it personally. Those of us in local
    government surely don't read things that come out, Dear Local
    Official. It also was an extremely bland letter. That is the
    first problem.
        Second, it is unbelievable the number of people that
    received it but didn't understand it--absolutely did not
    understand it. They had been to a meeting, perhaps they read
    the documents that were put out by the Bureau that said we are
    working with the post office, we have got good maps, we will
    take care of the census. If you want to join in, you can and
    add a few addresses. But a huge number of people believed the
    Bureau when the Bureau said, we are in good shape.
        I had heated discussions with some people. I preferred what
    Linda Magers in Georgia did. She works for the legislature. She
    would simply call the appropriate Senate or staff House member
    in Georgia and say, do you know that your local county is not
    going to participate? It is amazing when you call elected
    Representatives how quickly you get response in the local
    counties.
        Not every State had that sort of effort. In South Carolina,
    we did have that kind of effort, as well. Some people did not
    participate even when they signed up, because they got BAS
    maps, the boundary and annexation maps, and thought that was
    the LUCA map, because they came the same month. It was
    extraordinarily confusing.
        I have been living this stuff for 4 years. I even got
    confused in one town that I was called to look at and see which
    maps they were doing. I was halfway through explaining how they
    were going to do LUCA when I said, wait a minute, these are BAS
    maps, not LUCA maps. They came right after they got the letter
    about LUCA.
        Even the people in the regional offices have been confused
    about which program was being mailed out at which time.
        Mr. Miller. Do either of you gentlemen have any suggestion
    of why we are not getting the response?
        Mr. Rychnowski. Well, for one thing, actually, the Census
    Bureau, at least in our region--and in fact, I can talk for
    many of the regions, the rural areas of New York State--there
    is very little, if no, rapport with virtually any Federal
    agency in those rural areas. I mean, they just don't know, and
    there are times when we have to force communities to accept
    Federal grants, because they just don't trust the Federal
    Government--big government, for that matter.
        That is our job. We are supposed to work very closely with
    them. That is the reason we have a local government program.
    The second thing is that the communications were sent,
    virtually, to the wrong person. They were sent to the highest
    official. The highest official, generally, isn't the worker in
    the process.
        In many towns, the worker person is a clerk. Most of the
    time they didn't receive--they didn't see, the worker, the
    person who would actually do the work didn't receive those
    materials because the supervisor, the mayor, or whomever, threw
    them out. So, just as you said, you throw it out because it is
    not personalized.
        Mr. Miller. Go ahead.
        Mr. Maguire. One followup--in South Carolina we offered to
    give the Bureau a list of every highest elected official, and
    they did not want it. They said that is not the way they were
    doing it. During the reengineering conference with the Bureau 2
    years ago when we tried to get them to change LUCA in some
    positive ways, we asked them to put every planning director in
    America, every local planning director, on the list. When they
    send anything to the local official, always send a copy of it
    to the local planning official, and they didn't think that was
    a good idea.
        Mr. Miller. One final question for the three of you. How
    confident are you that the end result of the address lists they
    are going to work with for your areas are going to be the best
    possible? What is your level of confidence for your local area?
        Mr. Pettit. At least from Gilbert's perspective and
    Maricopa County's perspective, I think we can say it is going
    to be much improved over prior experience. I would not suggest
    that by any stretch of the imagination that we are satisfied or
    have a high level of confidence that it is going to be perfect.
        It is virtually impossible to be perfect given the rate of
    growth in the community. But the discrepancies that we have
    seen and reported that we haven't even had feedback on to know
    if our corrections were accepted yet, is leading to a great
    deal of discomfort and uneasiness with what is ultimately going
    to become available and used in the spring of 2000.
        Mr. Rychnowski. We have, I think, a very low confidence
    level. The issue of 500 people which was talked about, which
    may not mean a lot on a State level, it means an awful lot to a
    community. It means a lot in terms of being designated as an
    MSA. And therefore, all those programs that go along with being
    designated as the MSA. So as I said, in terms of the Seneca
    Nation that is also in our region, I know that enumerators have
    been asked to leave the reservation, because the Nation wanted
    to have their own enumerators. Well, the Census Bureau was not
    able to put anyone on right at this time, so there are problems
    across the board.
        These problems are going to continue. There are problems,
    obviously, in the 80 census--in the 90 census and those
    problems are going to continue if there is no real change.
        Mr. Maguire. The one thing that the accuracy of the list
    will depend on is the statement by Director Prewitt that they
    will mail questionnaires to addresses that do not match their
    block canvassing operation, but they will not do followup on
    those addresses. I know for a fact that our addresses will be
    99.9 percent, 100 percent, complete. I mean, we will not miss
    five addresses in Lexington County in what we send in. We have
    that good an information system.
        I also know they will reject many, and we will go through
    appeal if there is time to do it. But if they only mail
    questionnaires and don't do followup, LUCA will have failed in
    many places. In Lexington County, we will have communities that
    will be financially depleted in many ways for years to come. I
    say this knowing that Lexington County is far ahead of the game
    of most counties. Thank you.
        Mr. Miller. Thank you. Mrs. Maloney.
        Mrs. Maloney. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I want to thank
    all of the panelists. I know you traveled a long distance to be
    here, and you are out in the trenches getting the job done, and
    we really appreciate your being here.
        Particularly, I would like to welcome Mr. Don Rychnowski
    from the great State of New York, which is also my home State,
    and offer my words of helping you in any way. I will even
    travel up there to have a regional meeting with the people
    involved and see if I can do my own planning/training session
    with you.
        Mr. Rychnowski. Great.
        Mrs. Maloney. If you have any problems in any way, shape,
    or form, you can call me in my office. I have a stake--a
    personal stake--in New York State, and I certainly want to give
    all the help I can to get an accurate count.
        Mr. Maguire, my aunt for whom I am named lives in the great
    State of South Carolina, so I welcome you here today. I just
    wanted to followup on your statement that the Census Bureau was
    just using 1990 addresses. That is where they start. They start
    with the 1990 addresses. As Mr. Pettit said, they then go to
    the Postal delivery sequence file, which was an improvement,
    and they go through that. Then they follow it up with block
    canvassing.
        So, they are following it up with a lot of things, and they
    have to keep the list because it has to be accurate and they
    have to confirm it. I remember one of your earlier statements.
    You said they should just trust us and we will give them the
    list. But it reminds me of a story one of the census officials
    was telling me. They were working on a count and a local
    government was saying we want 20,000 people from our town. They
    counted, and they could only find 9,500. The local people were
    saying, well, go back out there and find 500 more. We need 500
    more. We wanted a 20,000 address list here.
        So, I think that you have to have a balance of getting the
    address list to the Census Bureau. That is why we do LUCA
    early, so that you can get that list, look at it, and say
    whether it is accurate or not and they can double confirm it.
    The point is that they have to have that confirmed list. I just
    wanted to add that.
        Mr. Pettit, we had a field hearing in the great State of
    Arizona, which was wonderful. I love your State. We went to an
    Indian reservation--great. And part of the testimony was on how
    greatly your State has grown in comparison to others. Did you
    testify at that hearing? You may have been there.
        Mr. Pettit. No, I didn't.
        Mrs. Maloney. They had a lot of charts showing how much the
    population had grown. It is phenomenal, absolutely phenomenal.
    One of the things that they talk about is that the Census
    Bureau has a new program for new construction. So, what about
    that which is added after March? That, I think, is a very
    legitimate point.
        It is my understanding they have a new construction program
    where they go right up to census day on new construction. And I
    would like a copy of that program to be in the official record,
    so that we have it right next to your testimony to show that
    they are going back on that official count.
        [The information referred to follows:]
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        Mr. Miller. No objection.
        Mrs. Maloney. I really want to go back to New York, because
    I want to help New York in any way, let me tell you. I was just
    looking at this press advisory, and it talks about local
    efforts. I mean, everything has got to be a team spirit, you
    know. We need the local governments to participate and to help
    us. It talks about the State budget, and it talks about
    California, which has allocated $24.5 million just to run
    census promotional materials.
        On the other hand, New York State has only $347,000 for
    census-related expenses. I am going to raise this at the
    bipartisan meeting of my delegation that possibly New York
    State should have more of an effort in promoting and working
    with local governments as California is. We are slated to lose
    population, to lose representation. As we all know, that is
    tied to the dollars that our local governments, our cities, and
    our counties need. So, getting an accurate count is so
    important really for getting the dollars where they are
    supposed to be and getting the population counted.
        You said part of the problem is--I am quoting from your
    testimony--you said the accuracy of the census comes down to a
    part-time municipal official that knows little about the census
    process and has no time to learn about it. I think that is a
    very important statement. Earlier the Director said they didn't
    build into their budget moneys to really go out into the
    localities and, you know, give staff assistance to localities.
        As I mentioned, some of the States are doing this, such as
    California. $24.5 million for census-related promotion and
    assistance is a serious commitment. Do you think that is
    something we should be looking at on the Federal level?
        Mr. Rychnowski. Actually, yes. I also am a member of the
    National Association Development Organization, which had
    proposed to the Census Bureau utilizing these development
    organizations, regional councils, councils of government, et
    cetera, across the Nation as part of the process, the census
    process. Because we are closer to those municipalities, we can
    walk into the Seneca, into the Reservation, easily without
    having any problems. We can work with church groups because we
    are there. We are part of those church groups.
        My understanding of the comment was that there were no
    funds available for this kind of activity. I would say that
    having seen the array of toys that were produced by the Census
    Bureau--stress balls and cup holders, and a variety of other
    things--that there probably were some funds available.
        And about your point about New York State, yes, I do agree
    that New York State is late getting into the process of
    providing assistance through some financial way. But what is
    not reflected in the figure that you quoted that there were
    other funds that have been allocated to the New York State
    Association of Regional Councils.
        Mrs. Maloney. Did that cover the Census Bureau--did the
    Census Bureau fund the Association of Regional Councils?
        Mr. Rychnowski. No.
        Mrs. Maloney. The State did?
        Mr. Rychnowski. New York State did, yes. And that is
    different. That is a higher figure now.
        Mrs. Maloney. Really?
        Mr. Rychnowski. Closing at about $800,000.
        Mrs. Maloney. Really? OK. I am glad to hear that. I just
    wanted to mention the chairman and I are working together. We
    are going to have a meeting coming up soon where we are
    inviting all of the Members, Democratic and Republican, to come
    together. I heard your statement about getting elected
    officials involved and having them call the professionals, that
    this really has an impact. We are going to be trying to get a
    partnership going with all of the Members of Congress. They
    should in turn go back and meet with their local offices, and
    they should be getting the elected officials involved.
        I wanted to mention one program that I think is great. I
    happen to have some copies here that I brought to give to you.
    It is called Census in the Schools, and this was mailed to
    every principal, and 40 percent of the teachers, and all the
    teachers in the undercounted areas. It's a curriculum to take
    into the schools to make the young kids aware of the census.
        My daughter came home with a mathematical problem on census
    day the other day. Her teacher is using this material. It also
    has material in Spanish and English for the young people to
    take home to their parents on ``Did you get your form, are you
    filling it out?'' I just think it is an innovative new edition.
        I really want to offer to Mr. Rychnowski, if you would
    like, I would be delighted to invite the chairman to join me in
    going up to your area----
        Mr. Rychnowski. Great.
        Mrs. Maloney [continuing]. And have a meeting with the
    local people, the local elected officials, the local census
    takers, and the local people involved, because I know that it
    is a hard job, and we want to help you in any way we possibly
    can. I used to represent a councilmanic district within the
    boundaries of Congressman Rangle's district, and I was very
    involved in the 1990 census. He would pull us all together, all
    the elected officials and community leaders, and say let's get
    out there and get your relatives hired as these census takers,
    and what are we doing to get the accurate count. Every month we
    would have these meetings, and I thought, wow, we are on top of
    the game. And then it came back that Mr. Rangle's area was one,
    I think, second to the lowest in accurate count in the Nation.
    It was undercounted.
        So, no matter what you do, it is hard to get certain places
    where people won't answer their doors and this type of thing.
    Whatever we do, we just have to do more of it. New York State,
    of course, I am partial, I think is such a beautiful, wonderful
    State, especially upstate New York, I think is gorgeous. So, we
    have got to get an accurate count so that we have our schools
    and our hospital centers--I love Arizona and South Carolina,
    too. I go to see my relatives there. And Arizona, we had a
    great time out there, didn't we? You have got the best climate.
        I just have one last question. I hope you will come up
    there with me for an upstate meeting in your region.
        Mr. Rychnowski. Great.
        Mrs. Maloney. We would love to do it. We have heard from
    the professionals earlier. I think they are really trying and I
    think that the GAO said they have made some progress. I just
    would like to hear from all of you, because you are out there
    on the front line. You understand, they have to keep that final
    list because they have to double-check it, because we have to
    have this accuracy.
        But do you have any ideas of how we could improve LUCA?
    That is my final question. I believe my time is up, and I would
    just like to ask all three of you to let us know what it is we
    should be doing to help the Census Bureau do a better job, how
    they could help you better. We have heard it throughout your
    testimony, but if you would like to give any more comments on
    it?
        Mr. Maguire. At this point we need to know what evidence
    will be accepted that proves an address in the appeals process.
    We are that close to midnight. We know what our addresses are.
    We know they won't find them. We know we have lots of different
    proofs. We have aerial photos, we have tax bills, we have
    pictures, we have inspectors who have certified for occupancy
    on housing. I have asked them what proof they will accept
    because we have got all of it. We even have high school
    students going out verifying sites.
        Mrs. Maloney. Do you know something? I am going to go to
    South Carolina and verify some of these sites.
        Mr. Maguire. We would like for you to.
        Mrs. Maloney. I would like to go see my relatives there. I
    tell you the truth. You have some sites that you have told the
    Census Bureau, this person or this house exists, and they are
    saying they disagree. I will personally go out there. I mean
    that. I can't do it when we are voting, but when we are out,
    when we are on recess, I will go if you get me, and the
    chairman--maybe I can get him to go down there.
        My aunt is a good cook. Do you like South Carolina? I will
    personally go. When you say you have got an address and you
    have told them this address exists, and they come back and tell
    you it doesn't exist, I will personally go and walk through the
    field, through the back road, up the tenement staircase,
    wherever it is, I will personally go and be with you to prove
    that the person exists.
        Mr. Maguire. I would be glad for you to.
        Mrs. Maloney. OK. And I mean that.
        Mr. Maguire. Just be sure you allow enough time. It may
    take a week to visit all of them.
        Mrs. Maloney. I can give you 2 days, not a whole week.
        Mr. Maguire. We will start early and run late.
        Mrs. Maloney. Two days from me, 2 days from him. OK? Fair
    enough.
        Mr. Maguire. Thank you.
        Mrs. Maloney. I can't promise his time--two from me.
        Mr. Pettit. I think from Arizona's perspective, we are
    census-sensitive. We know the value of that information. We
    participate. We have allocated resources.
        It may not show up in the line item in the State budget
    because we are committed at the local level. We are talking
    about municipalities that have hired people over the past 2
    years to work as a partner in this partnership, but there is no
    communication back to let us know whether our partners are
    accepting the information. Meeting the deadlines is key.
        You referred to this new construction program. We still
    don't have anything in writing about it yet at our level. We
    have been told that it is going to be coming out somewhere
    around October 15, but that is also in the same timeframe, plus
    or minus 30 days, when we hope to start getting information
    back on what our census, LUCA 2000, or LUCA 1998, or whatever
    we are going to call it, is going to look like.
        If we could develop a more sustainable and automated
    process to communicate addresses to the Bureau that they will
    accept--the post office accepts our addresses. The Census
    Bureau does not. The post office accepts our street maps,
    emergency services accepts our street maps. The census does
    not.
        There needs to be a cleaner line of communication, not only
    to improve LUCA, but for the future. Make sure that as we annex
    another 1,200 acres, like my council did last night just as I
    was leaving to catch the airplane, that is communicated to the
    Census Bureau and it is incorporated and is accepted at the
    point in time in which the transaction is completed, and not 5
    years later if we do a special census, or 10 years later if we
    wait for the decennial census. The communication and the
    feedback loop is really missing in this particular process.
        Mrs. Maloney. I would like to say that when we had our
    hearing, I was very impressed with the dedication of the
    Members of Congress from your area. They were very informed and
    the panels were very informed. And obviously, it is an issue of
    great concern to Arizona. I would just suggest that if you have
    any problems, I would go directly to your Congress people and
    get them to intercede for you. I just know that they are 100
    percent behind it just based on the amount of enthusiasm that
    they were showing at that meeting.
        Mr. Rychnowski. My organization is fairly lucky in terms of
    relationships to the other regional councils across in the
    Nation in that we had some flexibility, the ability to provide
    some assistance to our local governments, in that we already
    have local government programs.
        Many of the regional councils across this Nation do not
    have that flexibility. Basically, most regional councils work
    on a contract basis, 100 percent of their time is contracted
    for economic development or a particular purpose for a
    particular State or Federal entity.
        We need to have more local assistance early in the
    process--in the LUCA process, talking about 2010. I hate to say
    it, but this is the fourth census I have been involved
    professionally in. No matter how we may evaluate those other
    three, there was a series of meetings going on 4 years before
    the census. This time it was not.
        As I said, we need to work very closely. We need to have
    partners. I mean, it can't be a one-way partnership, which is
    kind of what I assess this one as, as sort of all give and no
    take, at least from the part of the locals. So, starting early
    and more technical assistance is basically what I think we
    need.
        Mrs. Maloney. I hope the chairman will join me in a public
    hearing in upstate New York Regional Council.
        Mr. Rychnowski. Good.
        Mrs. Maloney. Really. I think that would be a good use of
    our time.
        Mr. Miller. We have had several pre-field hearings, one in
    Phoenix, and it was really with the tribal leaders, and we did
    visit an Indian reservation. There are unique problems that you
    have in New York as they have in Arizona. We were in Miami to
    see the turns of inner-city areas, and we were in Wisconsin to
    see some rural areas. So, we have tried to go out, but we also
    appreciate you all making the effort to come see us, and we
    thank you very much for being with us today. Thank you.
        [Followup questions and responses follow:]
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        Mr. Miller. We will have our next and final panel. If you
    all want to just remain standing, as part of the procedures we
    have in this particular Government Reform Committee, we do
    swear in our witnesses. Raise your right hands.
        [Witnesses sworn.]
        Mr. Miller. Thank you. Please be seated. Thank you for
    being here today, and also, thank you for sitting through the
    first 3 hours of hearings. I don't know if you all have been to
    congressional hearings before. In one way, we are lucky, we
    have only had one series of votes. But these hearings are very
    valuable to us, even though just two of us are here--because
    other ones and a lot of staff are here, too--to get a better
    insight and understanding.
        And I think the last panel is important because you have
    the direct experiences. I think it is very important that we,
    in addition to doing field hearings, have people that can come
    here and tell us their experiences, and concerns, and problems,
    and ideas, and suggestions. This is a very good format.
        I thank you both very much for being here. Ms. Heinz--my
    eyesight is not that great--would you like to give an opening
    statement, please? And your official statement will be part of
    the record.

       STATEMENTS OF JESSICA HEINZ, LOS ANGELES CITY ATTORNEY'S
    OFFICE; AND MICHEL LETTRE, ASSISTANT DIRECTOR, MARYLAND OFFICE
                              OF PLANNING

        Ms. Heinz. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and
    Mrs. Maloney, for allowing me to testify to the committee. I am
    Jessica Heinz, an assistant city attorney for the city of Los
    Angeles, and I have been involved in census issues for the city
    since 1988. I have been the legal advisor for the city's
    technical and outreach projects in both the 1990 and 2000
    census.
        The city of LA has been working together with the Census
    Bureau as a participant in the LUCA program as authorized by
    the passage of the Census Address Improvement Act, and the law
    has allowed the city to share its own address list with the
    Bureau and in turn review the address lists prepared by the
    Bureau for census 2000.
        As you know, the LUCA program is divided into several
    phases. In phase 1, in order for the city to get ready for all
    that work, we started with our 1990 census address file and
    updated it with our Department of Water and Power electric
    meter file and several other address lists that were used by
    various city departments.
        When the Census Bureau gave us their LUCA file, it
    contained 1,351,815 addresses for the city. Our records showed
    1,483,904 addresses for the city. In November 1998, after
    comparing their list with our list, we submitted 196,690
    addresses, which we felt were missing and needed to be added to
    the Bureau's list.
        Both the Census Bureau's file and our file were matched to
    the Postal Service address file for accuracy.
        [Tape 2, side 2.]
        Ms. Heinz. There really needs to be another check done to
    be sure there are residences or other establishments that are
    on that mailing list.
        The next phase of LUCA began this past spring, and the
    Census Bureau conducted a full field verification of the city
    and Census Bureau addresses. Even after that process, we were
    told in the summer that there remained 135,570 city addresses
    which the Bureau was unable to verify as residential dwelling
    units. After rechecking our file with the Department of Water
    and Power Electric Meter file, we decided that those 135,000
    plus were still in dispute.
        In order to resolve this substantial number of
    discrepancies, the city's technical team and the regional
    Census Bureau staff met to discuss what method we should use to
    resolve the conflicts. The Bureau invited the city to assign
    staff as observers to accompany the Bureau in this effort.
        On September 9, the regional Census Bureau provided
    training to 42 city employees who were all sworn in, and we
    were assigned to one of four census field offices in the Los
    Angeles area, and we were paired up with a Census Bureau
    employee, and we began work to resolve the disputed addresses
    on September 13. The bulk of that work was completed last week
    and there is a small team that is continuing the work this
    week. We will have completed all 135,000 plus addresses.
        While we don't yet have the final information as to the
    total number of addresses which are to be deleted, redesignated
    or retained as a result of the field canvass process, we have
    learned a great deal about the nature of the discrepancies
    between the city's list and the Bureau's LUCA file.
        As part of the city's team, I received the Bureau training
    and I participated in the field canvass. I also received
    reports from other city staff regarding their observations in
    the field. From what we can determine thus far, the
    discrepancies fall into three categories.
        There are many commercial buildings which are listed as
    residential units on the city's electric meter file. By going
    out there, we could see what the problem was.
        There were several geo-coding errors, some of large
    significance, where trailer parks, for example, were put into
    the wrong block. That accounted for a substantial amount of the
    problem.
        In addition, there is new construction that had not yet
    been added into the LUCA file.
        Our experience in this process with the Bureau thus far has
    been very positive. Staff were well trained, and for the most
    part, diligent and enthusiastic about the assignments they were
    undertaking. We believe that our participation in the project
    will help, perhaps even alleviate, the need to pursue
    administrative remedies provided under the Commerce
    Department's regulations to resolve disputes.
        Perhaps most importantly, the Bureau's willingness to allow
    us to review their work in the field as active participants has
    done much to cement the partnership between the Regional Census
    Bureau and the city of LA's census outreach project. We expect
    that spirit of partnership will prevail in the next several
    months as we progress to the actual enumeration.
        Let me add, since you have raised the question of post
    census local review, that I don't believe that such a process
    will enhance the accuracy of the census if it is undertaken and
    implemented at this time. It will delay the delivery of the
    final data needed, and I think that in testimony I presented to
    you several months ago, I emphasized that we only added a very
    small number of addresses and persons as part of the census
    local review in 1990.
        It happens too late in the process, and by the time you go
    back out to find who is living at those addresses, people have
    probably moved, at least in a place like Los Angeles, where we
    are very transient.
        I think that local governments are better served if we can
    get information during the nonresponse followup stage regarding
    the areas of the city that are slow to return their
    questionnaires so that we can target our outreach in that area.
    I would like that kind of information on a flow basis as it
    comes in from the Bureau, which I think would be able to be a
    lot more helpful.
        In addition, I think one of the reasons that local
    governments may not participate in the LUCA process is because
    you basically have to be computerized in order to help. In
    addition, if your jurisdiction isn't over 50,000 or more, I
    don't think you get as much financial benefit from the Federal
    grants since there is some cutoff on population size. So, they
    may not be motivated that way.
        Anyway, thank you very much for this opportunity to discuss
    the LUCA process, and I will be happy to answer any questions.
    Thank you.
        [The prepared statement of Ms. Heinz follows:]
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        Mr. Miller. Mr. Lettre.
        Mr. Lettre. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Congresswoman
    Maloney. My name is Michael Lettre. I am the assistant director
    for the Maryland Office of Planning. We have had a long
    involvement with the Census Bureau as the major agency that has
    been involved with the statistical dissemination of census
    data.
        My history with the Office of Planning goes back to 1981,
    so I was involved with redistricting after the 1980 census,
    with promotion, and outreach, and technical assistance
    activities for the 1990 census, and I am serving as the
    Governor's technical coordinator for the 2000 census.
        We have heard a lot of testimony this morning and early
    afternoon. There are two words that come to mind--you have my
    official testimony, but I may deviate slightly from that--one
    is partnership and the other is opportunity. We took those
    words very seriously in Maryland when we chose to be very
    proactive in terms of our participation in the LUCA program.
        We also recognized the LUCA program had to be taken in the
    context of the overall census process, that it was not a cure
    for every problem. It was an opportunity to make an impact, and
    we promised ourselves that we would maximize that impact given
    the resources and the time that we had to do that.
        One of the things we did from the outset is to accept where
    the Census Bureau was and the products that they would provide
    to us. Ultimately, we found the products provided through the
    LUCA program very useful, very usable.
        In particular, we recognized that we were going to have to
    look at their address list. We were going to have to compare
    that to local address lists. We were going to have to identify
    problems with that list. Where we found addresses that needed
    to be added, we were going to have to assign them to the census
    geography, and we would have to report them back in the format
    that the Census Bureau asked if we wanted to increase and
    maximize the chance that the Bureau would accept the additions
    and corrections that we made.
        Now, that is a big assumption that many jurisdictions
    really didn't want to make. If you went into the program
    unwilling to sort of play by the rules, then you were off to a
    bad start, because you were spending your time, in essence,
    fighting the system as opposed to using a very useful product
    that was provided.
        The second thing that we realized is that if you were going
    to take advantage of this, and in Maryland where government is
    largely county government and most of the addresses are outside
    of incorporated boundaries--and I include Baltimore City as a
    county because it is officially a county as well as a
    municipality--then you were going to have to have three things
    if you were going to be able to be successful in this effort.
        And these were stressed by us; that is, the State, when we
    participated with the Bureau in all of the local training
    efforts. We made it very clear to local jurisdictions right up
    front, what they were going to do, what the Bureau was going to
    do, and what we were going to do.
        For a local jurisdiction to be successful, one, it had to
    have access to a good address list. Because they were going to
    be reviewing tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands,
    of addresses in a very short period of time, that address list
    had to be in a form that you could look at, and it couldn't
    simply be a paper listing. It wasn't practical that that was
    the case.
        So, you were going to have to have computer resources. That
    data base would have to be able to be spatially related to
    maps, because you were going to have to assign it the census
    geography. You were going to have to have the computers, the
    software, and you were going to have to have people that knew
    what they were doing and were dedicated to doing it.
        Without those things, then for many jurisdictions the
    perfect product from the Census Bureau simply would go
    unattended, because there would be no way to use that. That is
    particularly true anytime you are dealing with thousands, if
    not tens or hundreds of thousands, of addresses. There simply
    is no way to use a paper product over a short period of time to
    manage such a list.
        The third thing, in addition to the Bureau providing the
    product and the local government committing to participating
    and being an active partner, was what the State was going to
    do. We are fortunate in Maryland that we have been actively
    involved in developing a geographic information system, in
    which we have automated all of the State's property records
    along with property maps for all jurisdictions in Maryland. We
    were able and committed to making this electronic data base
    available in a format that could be used by local government
    either as the primary instrument for their LUCA review or as a
    supplemental instrument.
        We worked with 18 counties out of 24 that represented over
    95 percent of the State's addresses, and we developed a product
    that was a desktop mapping product that they could use on their
    desktop that was organized with the LUCA data product, with
    1990 census housing counts, and with our count of parcels, both
    individual addresses and aggregated addresses, that conformed
    to census geography.
        This enabled jurisdictions to immediately do two things.
    One is that they could pinpoint areas of major new development
    since the 1990 census. We went in initially with the thought
    that our major goal here would be to check areas where there
    had been substantial changes or growth since 1990, and that
    that would be an area where a jurisdiction could focus in on to
    make sure the Bureau, in fact, through their Postal work, was
    updating their addresses.
        The second thing we found after we actually got the census
    file is that there were some areas where there were major
    discrepancies even where there had not been substantial
    development since the 1990 census. So, we were able also to
    provide local jurisdictions with the following indicator; that
    is, the difference between the LUCA count of addresses and the
    local count of addresses that we had from the property or tax
    data base. And also, the difference between the LUCA count of
    addresses and the count of addresses, or housing units, from
    the 1990 census.
        What these indicators, using the mapping system, allowed
    local jurisdictions to do is to target in on the most severe
    problem. This meant that whatever time a local jurisdiction had
    to spend on the LUCA project they could maximize their
    utilization of people resources and computer resources to try
    to attend to the most severe problem.
        In addition, we got the regional office in Philadelphia to
    accept a list of 339 census blocks that we identified in these
    18 jurisdictions where there were significant discrepancies
    between our count of addresses and the Census Bureau's count of
    addresses. We got them to commit, even if that jurisdiction
    never submitted anything under LUCA, that the Census Bureau as
    part of their canvassing operation would pay particular and
    more detailed attention with their field people when they went
    out and canvassed in those areas.
        So, we didn't take the LUCA program simply as we got it. We
    played by the rules, we submitted submissions and had local
    governments do it where they maximized their utilization of
    time and resources. And we also provided the Census Bureau
    Philadelphia Regional Office with collateral information of
    significant problem areas.
        The results of this are, you know, in some cases somewhat
    alarming. I mean, we did find real unevenness in the quality of
    the product. There were some counties, both counties with rapid
    growth and counties without significant growth, where the
    product was very, very good. And there were some counties, and
    in some portions of counties, where there were real problems;
    problems in both missing new development and problems even in
    having addresses associated with pre-1990 development.
        But we do feel that the approach we took maximized the
    chances of getting attention in these areas, both because the
    local government submitted addresses and because we made the
    Census Bureau aware of these problem areas.
        We also encountered another problem that was indicated
    here. There are clearly some jurisdictions that have done
    wholesale readdressing, both numbers and sometimes street names
    as a result of the 911 process. There were instances where the
    Census Bureau file reflected addresses that were pre this 1990
    911-readdressing. We made the Bureau aware of those, and as a
    result, we do feel that the canvassing operations and the other
    operations that the Bureau will undertake will increase the
    probability of having an impact.
        In conclusion, I think everything has to sort of be
    evaluated in its time. We could always play the game of what we
    could do, you know, should haves--could haves. What we really
    did--and I can say this based on the 1990 experience and on the
    2000 experience--we took maximum advantage of where we were at
    this point in time to have the most positive impact that we
    could with the LUCA program, knowing that we would clearly draw
    the Bureau's attention to problem areas, make sure they were
    attentive to those problem areas, and assure that the LUCA
    program in conjunction with the other efforts of canvassing,
    and working with the Postal Service, and the new construction
    program would maximize the chance of having a state-of-the-
    art--that is as good as the state-of-the-art can be today--
    address file going into the 2000 census.
        And we feel confident that we did have an impact. There
    were 130,000 addresses that we recommended. Again, this is
    accumulative of 18 counties and 67 municipalities reporting. We
    had very a high participation rate, over 95 percent geographic
    coverage. Again, the number of local governments participating
    was less than that, but in terms of address coverage, very,
    very high.
        What we really did was use state-of-the-art resources
    combined with a partnership effort that involved State, local
    and the Federal partnership. I must say, what we did is we
    really worked it, and we didn't complain. We just did what we
    could do, knowing the limits of both the time and the resources
    that were there.
        There were instances in which we provided assistance to
    local governments and they clearly were not able to take full
    advantage of it. This does require strong technical skills. It
    requires computer resources to make it work. There is no
    getting around that when you are reviewing thousands of
    addresses and also geographic location of those addresses.
        So, we do feel that it was a workable program, that the
    Bureau provided products that could make a difference, and that
    we took the steps that we could given always the limits of
    time, money, and resources to get as much benefit as we could
    out of the program. We feel as though our participation was,
    one, rewarding and, in fact, will make a difference. Thank you
    very much.
        [The prepared statement of Mr. Lettre follows:]
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        Mr. Miller. Ms. Heinz, since you brought up post census
    local review, I am just amazed how people don't want to have a
    chance to have any input at the end of the process. I am just
    amazed that you say the census is going to be so perfect we
    don't need to worry about any mistakes being made because they
    are not going to make any mistakes. They are not going to leave
    off any apartment buildings. They are not going to leave off
    any subdivisions. So, we don't want to have that opportunity to
    check that. But that is your opinion and that is OK.
        Let me ask----
        Ms. Heinz. Could I answer that for just a----
        Mr. Miller. Yes. Why would you not want to have a chance to
    check a mistake? I don't understand that.
        Ms. Heinz. The problem is the timing. It is going----
        Mr. Miller. They can find time. They found it in 1990. I
    know this has, you know, been politically advised, but go
    ahead.
        Ms. Heinz. The issue is not so much even the political
    timing of it, but the fact that the census is supposed to
    happen in April. By the time you go through the local review
    process, at least in 1990, we didn't get the data until
    September. Even then, if we identified that there were missing
    units somewhere, you go back and you send enumerators out in
    September to try to find folks and they are not going to be
    there. That is the problem.
        That is why I said I would really like to have information
    during nonresponse followup that we are not getting back forms
    from the census tract so that we can go out and try to find out
    the problem.
        Mr. Miller. I believe there is time to do it and I am just
    amazed that you don't want to have that participation. So you
    are very satisfied with LUCA, that it has corrected all the
    problems so you shouldn't have an undercount in Los Angeles. Is
    that what you are saying?
        Ms. Heinz. Unfortunately, I think we will still have an
    undercount in Los Angeles.
        Mr. Miller. Well, at least you have a perfect list to start
    with, because you have corrected all the mistakes. Is that
    right?
        Ms. Heinz. I don't think the list will be entirely perfect,
    but it is definitely an improvement over 1990. The fact that we
    were able to understand the nature of discrepancies is very
    important, and that is a result of the Census Address List
    Improvement Act. We were able to go with the Bureau to see how
    our list had incongruities with the Bureau's list, and now we
    know why. So, that is important.
        Mr. Miller. Mr. Lettre, you represent the State. So, do
    they have a budget within the State, like California allocates
    certain money just for its census. Is there a budget for that?
    I am just curious.
        Mr. Lettre. Well, we have a State planning agency, which
    represents a large State commitment to good planning. That
    agency has had a very active--along with other State agencies--
    an active computer mapping system. Fundamental to working with
    census data is the ability to display addresses geographically
    on a map, whether they are the Bureau's or whether they are
    your own. We have a very active commitment to that.
        It parallels, but is not really funded in any way by the
    Census Bureau. What it does do is provide a resource that
    really complements what we are trying to do with census
    activities. And it is housed in the same agency so that it
    helps with coordination----
        Mr. Miller. What agency--explain that to me.
        Mr. Lettre. It is the Maryland Office of Planning, and it
    is an agency that is involved with land use planning.
        Mr. Miller. All of the planning agencies in the State?
        Mr. Lettre. All the planning agencies really--I mean, there
    are local planning agencies in both municipalities and
    counties. We have a very active relationship with them and, of
    course, that is where the burden of local review typically
    fell. So we had, you know, a network that we could work with
    and we had the technical resources that we could work with.
    Those are advantages. I mean, there are advantages that we have
    made and advantages that we chose to use. We did use them
    actively.
        Mr. Miller. As far as participation in LUCA, we were
    talking about that earlier, and 40 percent of communities
    around the country participated as far as following through on
    it. I sense that Maryland had a little bit higher success rate.
    Is that----
        Mr. Lettre. Well, like I said, we had 95 percent of address
    coverage, at least 95 percent of address coverage. We had 18
    counties out of 24, but the 6 that didn't really were counties
    that largely were part of the 1999 LUCA. They were largely
    rural counties and most of the geography that would have been
    covered in the 1998 were a few small towns, and so they were
    covered.
        Also, we have counties--since we are not wall-to-wall
    municipalities, we have some good working relationships where
    counties assisted municipalities within their jurisdiction.
    Don't forget, we have a strong county government system, and
    that is an advantage in a program like this as well.
        Mr. Miller. So you work mainly with counties rather than
    cities. Is that the way it works in Maryland?
        Mr. Lettre. We work with both, but we had a tier system,
    where a municipality could come directly to us because we
    literally provided them with a CD-ROM mapping product that they
    could use on their desktop with a standard computer and very
    inexpensive software. But those municipalities could come
    directly to us, or in some cases they partnered with their
    county government counterparts to do the work. The product we
    gave them was full county coverage, so it included information
    on both the nonincorporated as well as the incorporated portion
    of each one of those jurisdictions.
        Mr. Miller. One final question. Why would people not
    participate--what is your sense?
        Mr. Lettre. Well, first of all, we did have high
    participation.
        Mr. Miller. But those that did not participate----
        Mr. Lettre. What we did is we told jurisdictions right out
    front that there really was only one way to effectively
    participate, and that is you had to have those three things.
    You had to have a good local address list, you had to have a
    smart way of accessing it and using it, and you had to have the
    time and the people to do that, and you had to be committed
    after you were finished to responding to the Bureau in the
    format that they outlined, which was reasonable.
        I am not saying it was the easiest thing to do, but it was
    reasonable, because if you did respond in the format that they
    asked for, you maximized your chance of them either finding
    that housing unit and ultimately accepting it. So, what I am
    saying is we played by the rules. The rules involved both hard
    work and doing what you could do in the immediacy of the
    moment, not what you can do 3 years, 5 years, 10 years from
    now. It was doing what we could do now to make it as good and
    to have as much of an impact as we could.
        Mr. Miller. Thank you. Mrs. Maloney.
        Mrs. Maloney. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I would like to
    welcome these analysts. They both came here from distances and
    we appreciate your expertise and your testimony today.
        I would like to go back to a statement that Ms. Heinz said.
    She said you could have the address and maybe they didn't fill
    a form out, and then you could go back and maybe they wouldn't
    be there. I know that in 1990, the National Academy of Sciences
    and the Census Bureau said that 70 percent of the undercount
    was in households that received the mailing.
        So in other words, you could have a mailing, or rather an
    address list, that is 100 percent accurate. But if the people
    don't fill it out, and don't send it back, then they are going
    to be missed. I just want to make a question to you for your
    locality. I would like to ask you how much of the undercount
    was in households that received the form in Los Angeles, say,
    in 1990, and just didn't send it back?
        Ms. Heinz. What I understand is about 50 percent of the
    under-count in LA was within household misses. So, the
    household received the form but they didn't list everybody or
    there were nonstandard units within the household and they
    didn't include the people who were living in those areas of the
    household.
        Mrs. Maloney. So, to go back to a statement that Mr. Lettre
    made that you have to see LUCA in the whole framework of a
    total program that is out there, trying to get a local count--I
    know that the Census Bureau and the National Academy of
    Sciences said that 80 percent, I believe, in African-American
    homes received this form and did not send it back. Isn't the
    use of modern scientific methods the only way that you can get
    an accurate count?
        Ms. Heinz. Well, as you know, I was a participant in the
    1990 census and in the litigation regarding the use of the post
    enumeration survey to correct for the undercounts. I reviewed
    the materials that the Census Bureau has produced over the last
    decade, and I firmly believe that the statistical method is the
    only way to correct the undercount; particularly, in areas like
    Los Angeles, where we have large numbers of persons who are
    immigrants, who do not speak English, who do not live in
    standard dwelling units. About the only way that we believe
    that you can count them is through the use of the ACE process
    and the statistical adjustment.
        Mrs. Maloney. Setting aside problems with delays in getting
    LUCA review materials to participants, would you agree that
    having the opportunity to review the census address list, or
    address counts, and submit discrepancies to the Census Bureau
    will result in improvement and a more complete list for census
    2000? I would like to ask both panelists that question.
        Ms. Heinz. Absolutely. Cities need to take advantage of
    this opportunity. Compared to 1990, where all we got was a unit
    count of addresses per block, which we then had to count up our
    addresses and guess what was missing, we now can see the actual
    addresses. In particular, we have an understanding of how our
    system of collecting and having addresses when compared with
    the Bureau's methodology could lead to these discrepancies.
        I really hope that in the future, in 2010, if we have to go
    through this again, our own address list would be that much
    more accurate, because we know now what kinds of things we can
    do to correct it.
        Mrs. Maloney. Mr. Lettre.
        Mr. Lettre. I do think it was a very good opportunity and I
    think it was the appropriate opportunity for this point in
    time. I mean, I think that it made significant advances over
    what happened 10 years ago. Ten years from now, perhaps when we
    do it there will be an opportunity to make it even better. Part
    of that will be not only what the Bureau does but it will be
    also what local governments do; and this is that they will
    presumably have better, smarter computer systems, better
    geographic mapping systems.
        All of those things will allow this to occur in a smarter
    and better way at sometime in the future. I think there were
    opportunities to do it as smartly as you could this time
    around, and I think those jurisdictions that got the most
    benefit from this planned that and, in fact, took the maximum
    advantage they could at this point in time. I believe that it
    has made a difference and it has been a contribution to the
    overall effort to build a quality master address list.
        Mrs. Maloney. Did both of you participate in the Census
    Bureau's training program? If you did, would you comment on the
    training program? If you did not, would you state why you did
    not participate in the training program?
        Ms. Heinz. I participated in the training program. The
    early training that was done at the end of 1998 to describe the
    LUCA process, and also, in the most recent training that was
    done in advance of the field canvass. I thought it was very
    clear what the job of the listers was and I was pleased with
    it.
        Now, the one area where I think we might have used a little
    more assistance was having individuals in the field that spoke
    a greater variety of languages. That is something we need to
    work on.
        Mrs. Maloney. Did you participate?
        Mr. Lettre. Yes. As a matter of fact, our office really was
    the organization that worked with the Census Bureau to
    coordinate all of the training, both identifying the sites and
    locations. We were there at all the training and we
    supplemented the training because we informed the local
    governments of the technical assistance tools that we were
    going to be making available to help them. That was the
    beginning of our formal partnership with them.
        Again, nobody went this alone. Federal, State and local
    sort of joined at the hip.
        Mrs. Maloney. Well, my time is up. Thank you very much for
    your testimony.
        Mr. Miller. Thank you both for being here. You didn't have
    quite as far to drive from Baltimore, but----
        Mr. Lettre. I took the train.
        Mr. Miller. Train, yes. Thank you for being here.
        I ask unanimous consent that all Members' and witnesses'
    written open statements be included in the record. Without
    objection, so ordered.
        In case there are additional questions the Members may have
    for our witnesses, I ask unanimous consent for the record to
    remain open for 2 weeks for Members to submit questions for the
    record, and that witnesses submit written answers as soon as
    practical. Without objection, so ordered.
        Thank you, again, for being here. The meeting is adjourned.
        [Whereupon, at 1:30 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
        [Additional information submitted for the hearing record
    follows:]
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