June 2022 Census Project Update

Appropriations Update

FY 2023 Census Funding Approved by House Appropriations Committee

On June 28, the House Appropriations Committee approved the Commerce Justice Science (CJS) Appropriations Fiscal Year 2023 bill by a 31-24 vote, following the prior week’s approval of the bill in the House CJS Subcommittee.

The House bill matches the Administration’s request for the Census Bureau: $1.505 billion ($151.5 million above the FY 2022 enacted level). That includes $336,176,000 for Current Surveys and Programs and $1,169,294,000 for Periodic Census and Programs. The funding levels fall short of the Census Project’s FY 2023 recommendation, which was echoed by stakeholders and multiple Representatives and Senators.

The committee report outlines several priorities of interest to Census Project stakeholders, including: language encouraging the Census Bureau to continue its work with the Office of Management and Budget to revise race and ethnicity questions on federal surveys; a call for more information from the High Frequency Data Program; and a request for a briefing on how the Bureau is planning to“minimize [political] interference in the 2030 Decennial Census.” Further, the report, as sought in The Census Project’s FY2023 funding recommendation, encourages more support for the Population Estimates program. The Census Project published a blog that provides comprehensive details about the FY 2023 CJS report.

The bill will likely be scheduled for floor consideration in U.S. House of Representatives in mid-to-late July. The Senate Appropriations Committee has not announced when it plans to consider its version of the FY 2023 CJS bill.

Policy Update

U.S. House of Representatives Acts on Census Legislation

In June, there was action in the U.S. House of Representatives regarding two bills of interest to census stakeholders, the LGBTQI+ Data Inclusion Act (H.R. 4176) and the Honest Census Communications Act (H.R. 5815).

The LGBTQI+ Data Inclusion Act passed the full U.S. House of Representatives with bipartisan support by a 220 – 201 vote on June 23. The legislation would require the collection of voluntary, self-disclosed demographic data on sexual orientation, gender identity, and variations in sex characteristics (SOGISC) across federal surveys, while maintaining necessary confidentiality and privacy standards that govern federal statistics.

As part of its “Standard Deviations” blog series, The Census Project published a piece written by Caroline Medina, a senior policy analyst for the LGBTQI+ Research and Communications Project at the Center for American Progress, outlining the bill’s details, rationale and potential impact.

The House Oversight and Reform Committee passed the Honest Census Communications Act (H.R. 5815) on June 14, by a 22 – 16 vote. As The Census Project covered last year, H.R. 5815 would prohibit “any person, whether acting under color of law or otherwise, to communicate or cause to be communicated any census-related information by any means, including by means of any covered communication, or to produce any census-related information with the intent that the census-related information be communicated”:

“knowing the census-related information to be materially false”; and
“with the intent to impede or prevent another person from participating in any census.”

The bill would apply to the decennial headcount, the American Community Survey (ACS), the Economic Census and other similar Census Bureau surveys.

H.R. 5815 has not been scheduled for full consideration on the House floor. The bill’s Senate companion, S. 3133, has only two cosponsors, and is not likely to pass the Senate before the end of the year unless incorporated into a larger bill.

The Census Project published a blog providing additional details about the House bill and its outlook.

June “Standard Deviations” Features Views about Group Quarters and Census Accuracy

In June, members of the census stakeholder community published blogs on the 2020 Census as part of The Census Project’s ongoing “Standard Deviations” series:

On June 8, Dr. William O’Hare, President, O’Hare Data and Demographic Services wrote about a new paper he drafted that focuses on states ranked by net coverage and omission rates in the 2020 Census and offers ideas for further analysis, which would take advantage of state variation on census accuracy measures. His blog provides a link to his full paper.
On June 15, Cara Brumfield and Allison Plyer, Co-Chairs of the Census Quality Reinforcement Task Force, published a blog about the Census Bureau’s new Post-Census Group Quarters Review (PCGQR) program.

Census Project Launches Twitter Campaign to Promote ACS report

Throughout the month of June, The Census Project sponsored a series of advertisements to promote its recent report on the American Community Survey, “America’s Data At Risk.” The campaign ran through the first week of July and attracted over 430,000 “Impressions” on Twitter and brought over 50,000 users in our targeted D.C. audience to the site.

Census Bureau News

According to data from the 2021 Population Estimates, the Census Bureau revealed on June 30 that the median age for most states increased from 2020 to 2021, indicating their populations are getting older overall.

On June 30, the Census Bureau announced the release of six new states — Oregon, Hawaii, Massachusetts, South Dakota, Montana and Georgia — in the Post-Secondary Employment Outcomes (PSEO) experimental data product. PSEO now includes data on 660 institutions, which cover more than 25% of all college graduates in the United States in 2015.

In a June 23 release, the Census Bureau announced the departure this fall of Associate Director for Research and Methodology and Chief Scientist, John Abowd, who has held the position since June 2016, and the assignment to that position of Sallie Keller, division director and distinguished professor in biocomplexity at the Biocomplexity Institute at the University of Virginia.

Household Pulse survey announcements regarding phase 3.5 were issued in June regarding data collection and release activities.

A new report released on June 21 by the Census Bureau shows Asia’s population is aging faster than any other world region. The report also examines aging trends in Asia compared to other world regions and within Asia.

On June 15, the Census Bureau announced the launch of a new experimental survey to measure business conditions on an ongoing basis. The Business Trends and Outlook Survey (BTOS) is the successor to the Small Business Pulse Survey, a high-frequency survey that measured the effect of changing business conditions during the coronavirus pandemic and other major events like hurricanes on our nation’s small businesses.

On June 6, the Census Bureau released the newly designed cloud-based Census Geocoder web application that allows for faster and more efficient processing times.

On June 3, the Census Bureau announced the appointment of two new members of the Census Scientific Advisory Committee (CSAC). The panel provides recommendations on the design, operation, and implementation of Census Bureau programs.

Census Bureau Data Releases

On June 30, the Census Bureau released the 2019 Non-employer Statistics.

The Census Bureau released data from the Annual Capital Expenditures Survey (ACES) covering data year 2020 on June 15.

The Census Bureau released the May 2022 Business Formation Statistics (BFS) on June 9.

News You Can Use

Below are several articles posted on The Census Project home page in June 2022. For a complete listing, go to: https://thecensusproject.org/recent-media/.

U.S. continues to get older and more diverse, new estimates show
The Washington Post
June 30, 2022

Democracy Is Asking Too Much of Its Data
WIRED
June 29, 2022

Supreme Court Revives Republican-Drawn Voting Map in Louisiana
The New York Times
June 28, 2022

Arkansas declined to spend money on census, missed over 5% of its residents, report states
Arkansas Democrat Gazette
June 27, 2022

A federal law requires translated voting ballots, but not in Arabic or Haitian Creole
NPR
June 26, 2022

Census: 1 in 5 people who had COVID-19 report having long COVID
The Hill
June 22, 2022

US CENSUS BUREAU ANNOUNCES NEW BUSINESS TRENDS SURVEY
ResearchLive
June 22, 2022

Great News This Father’s Day: Marriage Rate Going Up, Census Show
DailyWire.com
June 18, 2022

A fair maps success story or ‘multi-layered stages of Dante’s Hell’? Where redistricting commissions worked — and didn’t work — this cycle
CNN
June 18, 2022

Feds taking first steps toward revising race, ethnic terms
Associated Press
June 16, 2022

2020 Census ‘Undercounts and Overcounts’ Could Determine if Democrats or Republicans Have Control of US House
CBN News
June 16, 2022

House Panel Passes Bill Meant to Stop Census Misinformation
Associated Press
June 15, 2022