[Federal Register Volume 87, Number 244 (Wednesday, December 21, 2022)]
[Notices]
[Page 78044]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2022-27708]



[[Page 78044]]

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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

Census Bureau


Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission to the 
Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for Review and Approval; Comment 
Request; Survey of Construction Questionnaire for the Building Permit 
Official (SOC-QBPO)

    The Department of Commerce will submit the following information 
collection request to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for 
review and clearance in accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 
1995, on or after the date of publication of this notice. We invite the 
general public and other Federal agencies to comment on proposed, and 
continuing information collections, which helps us assess the impact of 
our information collection requirements and minimize the public's 
reporting burden. Public comments were previously requested via the 
Federal Register on October 13, 2022 during a 60-day comment period. 
This notice allows for an additional 30 days for public comments.
    Agency: U.S. Census Bureau, Commerce.
    Title: Survey of Construction Questionnaire for the Building Permit 
Official (SOC-QBPO).
    OMB Control Number: 0607-0125.
    Form Number(s): SOC-QBPO.
    Type of Request: Regular submission, request for an extension, 
without change, of a currently approved collection.
    Number of Respondents: 1,000.
    Average Hours per Response: 15 minutes.
    Burden Hours: 250.
    Needs and Uses: The U.S. Census Bureau is requesting an extension 
of the currently approved collection for the Survey of Construction 
Questionnaire for the Building Permit Official (SOC-QBPO). The 
information collected on the SOC-QBPO is necessary to carry out the 
sampling for the Survey of Housing Starts, Sales and Completions (OMB 
number 0607-0110), also known as the Survey of Construction (SOC). 
Government agencies and private companies use statistics from the SOC 
to monitor and evaluate the large and dynamic housing construction 
industry.
    The SOC-QBPO is an electronic questionnaire. The field 
representatives (FRs) either call or visit the respondents to enter 
their survey responses into a laptop computer using the Computer 
Assisted Personal Interviewing (CAPI) software formatted for the SOC-
QBPO. The overall length of the interview will not change, and the 
sample size will only receive a minor downward adjustment.
    The Census Bureau FRs use the SOC-QBPO to obtain information on the 
operating procedures of a permit office. This enables them to locate, 
classify, list, and sample building permits for residential 
construction. These permits are used as the basis for the sample 
selected for SOC. The Census Bureau also uses the information to verify 
and update the geographic coverage of permit offices.
    Failure to collect this information would make it difficult, if not 
impossible, to accurately classify and sample building permits for the 
SOC. Data for two principal economic indicators are produced from the 
SOC: New Residential Construction (housing starts and housing 
completions) and New Residential Sales. Government agencies use these 
statistics to evaluate economic policy, measure progress towards the 
national housing goal, make policy decisions, and formulate 
legislation. For example, the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve 
System uses data from this survey to evaluate the effect of interest 
rates in this interest-rate sensitive area of the economy. The Bureau 
of Economic Analysis (BEA) uses the data in developing the Gross 
Domestic Product (GDP). The private sector and other data users from 
Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the National 
Association of Home Builders (NAHB) use the information for estimating 
the demand for housing, building materials and the many products used 
in new housing and to schedule production, distribution, and sales 
efforts. The financial community uses the data to estimate the demand 
for short-term (construction loans) and long-term (mortgages) 
borrowing.
    Affected Public: State, local, or Tribal government.
    Frequency: Annually.
    Respondent's Obligation: Voluntary.
    Legal Authority: Title 13, United States Code, sections 131 and 
182.
    This information collection request may be viewed at 
www.reginfo.gov. Follow the instructions to view the Department of 
Commerce collections currently under review by OMB.
    Written comments and recommendations for the proposed information 
collection should be submitted within 30 days of the publication of 
this notice on the following website www.reginfo.gov/public/do/PRAMain. 
Find this particular information collection by selecting ``Currently 
under 30-day Review--Open for Public Comments'' or by using the search 
function and entering either the title of the collection or the OMB 
Control Number 0607-0125.

Sheleen Dumas,
Department PRA Clearance Officer, Office of the Chief Information 
Officer, Commerce Department.
[FR Doc. 2022-27708 Filed 12-20-22; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-07-P