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CENSUS 2010: USING THE COMMUNICATIONS

CAMPAIGN TO EFFECTIVELY REDUCE THE

UNDERCOUNT

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON INFORMATION POLICY,

CENSUS, AND NATIONAL ARCHIVES

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT

AND GOVERNMENT REFORM

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

JULY 10, 2008

Serial No. 110–124

Printed for the use of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpoaccess.gov/congress/index.html

http://www.oversight.house.gov

(II)

COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM

HENRY A. WAXMAN, California, Chairman

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

DIANE E. WATSON, California

STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts

BRIAN HIGGINS, New York

JOHN A. YARMUTH, Kentucky

BRUCE L. BRALEY, Iowa

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of

Columbia

BETTY MCCOLLUM, Minnesota

JIM COOPER, Tennessee

CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland

PAUL W. HODES, New Hampshire

CHRISTOPHER S. MURPHY, Connecticut

JOHN P. SARBANES, Maryland

PETER WELCH, Vermont

JACKIE SPEIER, California

TOM DAVIS, Virginia

DAN BURTON, Indiana

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut

JOHN M. MCHUGH, New York

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

CHRIS CANNON, Utah

JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee

MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio

DARRELL E. ISSA, California

KENNY MARCHANT, Texas

LYNN A. WESTMORELAND, Georgia

PATRICK T. MCHENRY, North Carolina

VIRGINIA FOXX, North Carolina

BRIAN P. BILBRAY, California

BILL SALI, Idaho

JIM JORDAN, Ohio

PHIL BARNETT, Staff Director

EARLEY GREEN, Chief Clerk

LAWRENCE HALLORAN, Minority Staff Director

SUBCOMMITTEE ON INFORMATION POLICY, CENSUS, AND NATIONAL ARCHIVES

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri, Chairman

PAUL E. KANJORSKI, Pennsylvania

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

JOHN A. YARMUTH, Kentucky

PAUL W. HODES, New Hampshire

MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio

CHRIS CANNON, Utah

BILL SALI, Idaho

TONY HAYWOOD, Staff Director

(III)

C O N T E N T S

Page

Hearing held on July 10, 2008 ............................................................................... 1

Statement of:

Harrison, Roderick, director, Databank, joint Center for Political and

Economics Studies; Dr. Barbara A. McKinzie, Chair, 2010 Census Subcommittee, National Pan-Hellenic Council; and David J. Lange, general

manager, Scholastics Marketing Partners, Scholastic, Inc. ...................... 73

Harrison, Roderick .................................................................................... 73

Lange, David J. ......................................................................................... 96

McKinzie, Barbara A. ................................................................................ 85

Murdock, Steven H., Director, Bureau of the Census, U.S. Department

of Commerce; and Jeff Tarakajian, executive vice president, Client

Services, DraftFCB ....................................................................................... 34

Murdock, Steven H. ................................................................................... 34

Tarakajian, Jeff ......................................................................................... 43

Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by:

Baca, Hon. Joe, a Representative in Congress from the State of California, prepared statement of ........................................................................... 112

Clay, Hon. Wm. Lacy, a Representative in Congress from the State of

Missouri, prepared statement of .................................................................. 3

Clyburn, Hon. James E., a Representative in Congress from the State

of South Carolina, prepared statement of ................................................... 10

Gonzalez, Hon. Charles A., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Texas, prepared statement of .................................................................. 27

Harrison, Roderick, director, Databank, joint Center for Political and

Economics Studies, prepared statement of ................................................. 76

Lange, David J., general manager, Scholastics Marketing Partners, Scholastic, Inc., prepared statement of ............................................................... 98

Maloney, Hon. Carolyn B., a Representative in Congress from the State

of New York:

Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 23

Prepared statement of Donald L. Evans ................................................. 15

McKinzie, Dr. Barbara A., Chair, 2010 Census Subcommittee, National

Pan-Hellenic Council, prepared statement of ............................................. 87

Murdock, Steven H., Director, Bureau of the Census, U.S. Department

of Commerce, prepared statement of ........................................................... 36

Rangel, Hon. Charles B., a Representative in Congress from the State

of New York, prepared statement of ........................................................... 114

Tarakajian, Jeff, executive vice president, Client Services, DraftFCB, prepared statement of ........................................................................................ 45

(1)

CENSUS 2010: USING THE COMMUNICATIONS

CAMPAIGN TO EFFECTIVELY REDUCE THE

UNDERCOUNT

THURSDAY, JULY 10, 2008

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SUBCOMMITTEE ON INFORMATION POLICY, CENSUS, AND

NATIONAL ARCHIVES,

COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM,

Washington, DC.

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 2 p.m., in room

2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Wm. Lacy Clay (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.

Present: Representatives Clay, Maloney, Watson, and Turner.

Also present: Representatives Clarke, Clyburn, Baca, Gonzalez,

Sires, Honda, Jackson-Lee of Texas, Lee of California, and Kilpatrick.

Staff present: Darryl Piggee, staff director/counsel; Jean Gosa,

clerk; Alissa Bonner and Michelle Mitchell, professional staff members; Charisma Williams, staff assistant; Dorian Rosen, intern;

Benjamin Chance, minority professional staff member; and John

Cuaderes, minority senior investigator and policy advisor.

Mr. CLAY. The subcommittee will come to order. The Information

Policy, Census, and National Archives Subcommittee of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee will now come to order

and good afternoon.

Today’s hearing is entitled, ‘‘2010 Census: Using the Communications Campaign to Effectively Reduce the Undercount.’’ We will examine the Census Bureau’s plans to use the 2010 integrated communications campaign to attain an accurate enumeration of traditionally hard to count populations. We will also examine whether

the Bureau is on course to build on the successes of the 2000 census.

We are privileged to have with us today several guests who are

here. We have, in attendance, Members of the tricaucus. The

tricaucus is comprised of Members of the Congressional Black Caucus, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and the Congressional

Asian Pacific American Caucus.

Two of the Chairs are here, and one is the Honorable Mike

Honda, and filling in for the Honorable Joe Baca will be Mr. Gonzalez from Texas. Also, we have the Honorable Yvette Clarke and

the Honorable Albio Sires. I want to welcome them all here. Also,

Honorable Yvette Clarke from New York, thank you for being here

too.

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I am going to ask unanimous consent that they and our other

colleagues who will show up today to join us be recognized for

opening statements and questions and allowed to sit on the dais.

Without objection so ordered.

And, without objection, the Chair and the ranking minority member will have 5 minutes to make opening statements followed by

opening statements not to exceed 3 minutes by any other Member

who seeks recognition.

And, without objection, Members and witnesses may have 5 legislative days to submit a written statement and extraneous materials for the record.

As I stated earlier, we will focus on the U.S. Census Bureau’s

plans to accurately count historically undercounted populations including racial, ethnic and language minorities during the 2010 decennial. I am pleased to welcome several visiting Members to this

important hearing.

The census is a vital, constitutionally mandated survey that policymakers and demographers rely on to make decisions, allocate

over $300 billion in Federal funding annually, reapportion congressional seats and redistrict within States. Therefore, it is essential

that the data be complete and accurate.

The Bureau will use its communications campaign to help improve accuracy, increase the mail response rate and reduce the differential undercount. Unfortunately, cost overruns in other areas

have fueled concerns regarding the Bureau’s budget for the communications campaign.

Given the high level of distrust of government in hard to count

communities, the Bureau cannot risk the impact of underfunding

the campaign which encompasses the successful Partnership and

Census in Schools Programs.

While I can appreciate the budget challenges that resulted from

the Bureau’s decision to revert to a paper census, most would agree

that the communications campaign is underfunded. In order to duplicate the accomplishments of the 2000 census, which undercounted over 3 million people, the communications campaign needs

millions of more dollars.

It is equally disturbing to learn that funding for outreach to minority communities has been cut or reprogrammed when these

communities have the greatest needs.

An inaccurate 2010 census will leave many States without their

fair share of Federal dollars and will handicap local governments

for 10 years.

With less than 2 years until the 2010 census, I looked forward

to the testimony of our witnesses and learning how Congress can

best partner with the Bureau in addressing these concerns.

Now I will yield to the ranking member to be recognized for

opening statements.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Wm. Lacy Clay follows:]

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Mr. TURNER. Thank you, Chairman Clay, for holding this important hearing on the communications plan for the 2010 census.

As the hearing title indicates, we will examine the use of the

Census Bureau’s communication campaign to help effectively reduce the undercount for 2010. The Bureau’s communication campaign is a key component in the overall strategy to ensure a fair

and accurate census.

I agree with Chairman Clay that as we move closer to census

day, we need to pay more attention on how we reach the traditionally hard to count areas. We should also ensure that the guiding

principle for the communication campaign is the same guiding

principle for the census, to reach as many people as possible.

To be a truly effective communication campaign, communication

efforts should reach all those living in the United States and its

territories. It is important to address the traditionally hard to

count areas as we can all agree that an undercounted census does

a disservice to all of those involved. It is equally important, however, not to neglect other areas.

I hope this hearing will give us a better understanding of the Bureau’s efforts to communicate to American people the importance of

participating in our national census.

Furthermore, I look forward to reading about the types of communication strategies to be employed by the Bureau. With all of

the tools available in today’s information age, the Bureau should

have a sound and relevant plan to make the best use of its resources.

Census Day is April 1, 2010. Therefore, with less than 3 years

for the Bureau to effectively communicate their message to the

American people, this hearing is as timely as it is relevant.

Again, I would like to thank the chairman for holding this hearing. Additionally, I would like to thank the witnesses for their testimony and participation.

With that, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you very much, Mr. Turner.

It is our privilege to have with us today our distinguished Majority Whip, the Honorable James Clyburn. Welcome, Mr. Majority

Whip and you may proceed.

Mr. CLYBURN. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Thank you

so much for allowing me to participate in this hearing, and I thank

you, Ranking Member Turner and other distinguished members of

the subcommittee.

This decennial census is an essential constitutionally mandated

program that determines representation in Congress, State legislatures and local boards and councils for the next decade. In addition, data from the census is used to allocate billions of dollars in

Federal funds for housing, social services and other vital programs.

Therefore, it is imperative that all citizens be fully counted.

Unfortunately, in each census, from its very beginning, the Bureau has missed millions of people. While the Bureau improved its

performance in 2000 relative to 1990, the 2000 census is estimated

to have mixed 6.4 million people and double-counted 3.1 million for

a net undercount of 3.3 million.

Now I have a real, real problem with these statistics because

what it says here, as we know from our own experiences, the peoVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:55 Mar 24, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00012 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\47524.TXT KATIE PsN: KATIE
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ple who are undercounted live in communities that are in the most

need and the people who get overcounted are those people with second and third homes and, therefore, are people who live in communities that have less need.

Therefore, I think it is very, very important this year, in view of

what our experiences have been, Mr. Chairman, with immigration

issues, with our community responses to immigration, with the catastrophic events that we have had all over our Nation that have

displaced people significantly. I think that we need to do more in

this coming census to make sure that we put in very sophisticated

procedures to make sure that we lessen the undercount and hopefully eliminate the overcount.

Now some census data are used to determine government dollars,

paved roads, provide healthcare in addition to drawing election district lines. Accurate census data are the only way to assure that

local communities receive their fair share of Federal funds and for

people to get effective representation in their various elective bodies. Thus, every available means must be employed to ensure a fair

and accurate census count in 2010.

The Census Bureau must let the Members of Congress know

where its funding needs are to effectively plan and execute the

2010 integrated communications campaign. I want to really emphasize that fact.

We are, especially the House of Representatives, this is where

constitutionally the money is supposed to start. Please make us

aware of what the actual needs are.

I don’t think we ought to start out shortchanging this process.

We must find out exactly what we need to do because it is important to the Members here that people get counted and communities

get the services that they need.

I think it is imperative that the Bureau continue to establish

partnerships with neighborhood organizations to assist and encourage individuals to fill out their census forms.

I have had real experiences with this, and I can tell you that in

many communities where we have not used local people, there is

not comfort level existing among the enumerators, and therefore

they tend to look down certain streets or what we might call pathways and estimate what may exist in certain homes. I guess it

would be better said to guesstimate what may exist there than to

have actual counts.

When we form partnerships with people who live in these communities, who socialize in these areas, we stand a much better

chance of getting a good count. To truly reach out to historically

undercounted communities, the Bureau must hire a larger percentage of minorities and people who have great contact with minority

communities.

I, along with my colleagues, am committed to working with the

Bureau to ensure that our constituents are adequately represented

and counted, and I might add appropriately so.

Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman. I yield back the balance of

my time.

[The prepared statement of Hon. James E. Clyburn follows:]

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Mr. CLAY. Thank you, Mr. Whip. I appreciate your opening statement and your participation in this hearing.

Mr. Honda of California is recognized for an opening statement.

Mr. HONDA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Before I start, I just want to acknowledge the Majority Whip Clyburn for not only being at this hearing but also at other hearings

such as the health disparities and representing the party and the

communities from a leadership level also. So I just wanted to acknowledge that and let him know that it is being recognized.

Now with the questions about the ability of the Census Bureau

to conduct a successful 2010 census, I am very concerned about

whether the Bureau has the resources and commitment to place

adequate focus on traditionally undercounted communities.

I want to thank Chairman Clay for his attention and commitment to reducing the undercount and increasing response rates

within minority communities. We are truly fortunate to have such

a vigilant chairman on our side.

As Chair of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus

and an appropriator on the Commerce, Justice and Science Subcommittee I, myself, will continue to keep a close watch on the priorities of and funding for programs that seek to reach and outreach

to Asian American, Pacific Islander and other minority communities.

Outreach to Asian American and Pacific Islander communities

presents particular challenges with its tremendous diversity in language, culture, income level, geographic distribution in this country

and trust in government.

I look forward to hearing testimony on the communications campaign, the partnerships and outreach program and the Census in

Schools program that were each integral to reaching hard to count

populations in 2000.

Once again, thank you, Mr. Chairman, for ensuring that funding

is used appropriately and for your commitment to an accurate

count for all communities. I yield back.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much for that opening statement.

Mr. Sires.

Mr. SIRES. Thank you. I will just take a minute.

I went through the last census. I was a local mayor, and I

couldn’t agree more with the Majority Whip. I think the input of

locals is extremely important.

I represented a community that was 76 percent below poverty

level, 93 percent Hispanic student body. Most of them did not

speak English. As the mayor, I had to be actively making sure that

everybody was counted, and those are the people that need it the

most.

I am here to learn, to see what I can do to help and make sure

that the funding is there because the people that need it the most

are the ones that are never counted.

Thank you.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much.

Mrs. Maloney, you are recognized for an opening statement.

Mrs. MALONEY. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman, and I especially want to congratulate Leader Clyburn for being here today. It

shows the importance that the Democratic leadership places on getVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:55 Mar 24, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00017 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\47524.TXT KATIE PsN: KATIE
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ting an accurate census, and it builds on his record of being one

of the leaders of supporting and making sure that we get an accurate census.

Mr. Chairman, you are to be commended for scheduling this vital

oversight hearing. The timing could not be more critical. It comes

on the heels of a decision by the Department of Commerce to cancel

their long planned automation of the 2010 census data collection as

well as press accounts this week of growing concerns about the

planning and management of the decennial census by this administration.

Since the first American census in 1790, the challenge for the career census professionals has always been to improve on the most

recent census. They strive to make the next census even more accurate and to ensure to the best of their abilities that we count every

resident in America. Today, that challenge is the most difficult they

have ever confronted.

By all measures, the 2000 census was the most successful and

the most accurate in history. A great part of that success in 2000

was to the first ever use of paid advertising. Indeed, President

Bush’s good friend and former Secretary of Commerce, Don Evans,

testified before the Senate in May 2001 and made exactly that

point, ‘‘Census 2000 was an operational success. The Census Bureau met or exceeded its goals including meeting the mandated

deadlines for releasing data for use in apportionment and redistricting. This success can be attributed to the Congress’ commitment to providing full funding for a number of improvements including unprecedented outreach programs to groups that historically had the greatest undercounts.’’

Further on in his testimony, Secretary Evans singled out and

gave the most credit for this achievement to the advertising program, the Partnership Program, the Census in Schools and improved census forms.

Without objection, Mr. Chairman, I would like to submit the entire testimony of Secretary Evans into the record, and I believe it

represents an important benchmark for us to measure against the

current planning.

Mr. CLAY. So ordered.

[The information referred to follows:]

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Mrs. MALONEY. Thank you.

Amazingly, in our hearings and in press accounts, we are learning instead of building upon the successful operations, this Commerce Department is trying to scale them back. You have shrunk

the Census in Schools programs, delayed by a year the start of the

Partnership Program, and in real dollars you are spending less on

paid media to a population that has grown and is even more diverse than the population in 2000.

I have to say, Director Murdock, this makes absolutely no sense.

Just when your decennial plan is in a crisis, when the GAO and

the MITRE Corp. and other independent reviews are saying you

face a critical challenge to increase response rates and reduce the

universe of households you must visit, you are shrinking the very

programs proven to increase cooperation with the census.

Through 22 decennial headcounts in our history, the career professionals at the Census Bureau have a set new Olympic record for

accuracy in all but one. As they prepare for the 2010 census, it

seems their coaching staff has let them, and it is failing to give

them the tools they need to succeed. You, instead, are asking them

to do much more with fewer resources.

Our population is much larger than 10 years, more diverse, living in more complex housing arrangements, relying upon incredibly

more varied media, with polls showing historically low levels of

trust in their government and leaders.

Mr. Chairman, I think it is very important that we use this hearing today to formally get on the record the true scope and scale of

the advertising, partnership and promotion efforts being planned in

2010 and how those plans compare with actual spending in 2000.

I hope we can wade deep into the details of how much is being

spent to help cure the undercount that every census experiences

and how much is being spent on those communities that are historically the hardest to count.

Again, I thank you for your extraordinary leadership, Mr. Chairman, and my compliments to the ranking member too, but especially to our Leader Clyburn and thank you very much for being

here.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Carolyn B. Maloney follows:]

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Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much, Mrs. Maloney.

Mr. Gonzalez is recognized for an opening statement.

Mr. GONZALEZ. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and, of

course, Ranking Member Turner, members of the subcommittee

and our esteemed Majority Whip, Mr. Clyburn.

Good afternoon and thank you for the opportunity to participate

in today’s hearing on the 2010 census’ integrated communications

campaign. I am here today representing the Congressional Hispanic Caucus even though I saw Mr. Baca here a minute ago, who

is chairman of the Caucus.

I welcome one and all as far as the witnesses, and I hope that

we have a very productive hearing which I believe we will.

When I first arrived to the House of Representatives in 1998, I

was tasked with leading the Congressional Hispanic Caucus’ 2000

census effort. At that time, my colleagues and I were heavily involved in working with the Census Bureau and stakeholders with

the express goal of achieving an accurate census as possible.

The Partnership and Marketing Program, as it was known then,

was the first of its kind. It achieved its main goal, engaging multiple community partners to get the word out about the census and

increase response rates. Though we still ended up with a minority

undercount, it was less than it could have been. I still think of that

particular count as a success.

I still hold hope that we can be successful today. However, all the

commentary in the press recently telling us that the 2010 census

effort is in shambles and that dramatic changes are needed at the

Department of Commerce and Census Bureau management if we

expect to execute a timely and accurate census certainly gives us

pause, and I hope that we can allay some of those fears and maybe

even misconceptions.

I expect today’s hearing focusing on the communications campaign for the upcoming 2010 census should help provide us some

answers and surely a clearer picture.

In anticipation of today’s hearing, the Hispanic Caucus contacted

the advertising firm responsible for the Hispanic portion of the

2010 census communication plan. While they are still in the planning stages and state they possess the resources to perform their

portion of the campaign, I am disturbed by reports noting that

funding for the 2010 census communication plan might be insufficient to carry out on the scale that we saw in 2000.

We are pleased that the Bureau has seen fit to bring this team

onboard, and we are certain they will do a good job. However, if

these statements are true, I fail to see how the Bureau expects to

achieve the same level of success this time as we had here in the

last 2000 census. I would note that now is not the time for the census to handicap its partners in such an important endeavor.

Additionally, I am concerned with the decision to scale back the

Census in Schools Program, fully eliminating any outreach to students in grades 7 through 12. I know I speak for my colleagues

when I say that I would like to see what data the Bureau has to

support the decision to curtail a program that actually worked the

last time.

I hope the witnesses today will be able to explain whether we

should expect to see an effort along the same scale as we had in

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the 2000 census, the same breadth, the same scope or should we

expect a reduced effort by the Census Bureau to reach out to our

communities represented here today.

I look forward to hearing from all of the witnesses this afternoon

to answer these concerns and to share their insight on how we

credibly move forward despite some of the bumps the Agency has

experienced up until now, and I yield back, Mr. Chairman.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Charles A. Gonzalez follows:]

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Mr. CLAY. Thank you, Mr. Gonzalez, and we look forward to your

participation in this process especially with all of your experience

with the census.

Ms. Clarke, you are recognized for an opening statement.

Ms. CLARKE. I just wanted to take this opportunity to thank the

distinguished chairman, William Lacy Clay, and the ranking member, Michael Turner, as well as Majority Whip Clyburn and I see

the various Chairs of the caucuses of color here on the Hill as well

as my colleagues for their participation and inviting me for this extremely important dialog brought before the subcommittee.

I also thank you witnesses for taking the time out of your busy

schedules to testify today.

Currently, it appears that we must urgently address the fact that

the U.S. Census Bureau has customarily undercounted countless

people of color. When we look at, for example, the 2000 census, it

failed to count an estimated 600,000 African Americans.

I want to put that into the context of today if indeed that number

is correct. When you look at what is happening in terms of mortgage foreclosures and homes closing and for communities like mine

in Brooklyn, NY, the increased and heightened immigration enforcement and the fear that has begun to permeate mixed communities of immigrants and citizens, that makes your task even more

important.

The U.S. Census Bureau is important to many communities of

color because, as we know, the Federal Government uses these

numbers to allocate funding for community programs and services

such as education programs, housing, community development,

healthcare services for the elderly and job training.

State, local and tribal governments use census information for

planning and allocating funds for new school construction, libraries

and locations for police and fire departments.

Community organizations use census information to develop social services programs, community action projects, senior lunch programs, childcare centers. The list goes on and on, the infrastructure of our civil society.

I am concerned about the shortfall of funding required to make

this effort successful. I would like to say at the end of the day that

we are not doing an exercise in futility. Certainly, the variables

that we see before us right now lead us to a conclusion that we are

not prepared financially and otherwise to put forth our best effort.

So, today, I look forward to hearing all of the witnesses’ testimony so that we can come up with recommendations that can be

legislatively enacted before the 2010 census.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair, and I yield back the balance

of my time.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much, Ms. Clarke.

Are there any other Members who would like to make an opening statement?

Ms. Jackson-Lee.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Mr. Chairman, let me offer my greatest appreciation to you and the ranking member and the collective body of

intellect and commitment and dedication to the cause of improving

the lives of all Americans.

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The census is a lifeblood of this Nation, and might I take particular personal privilege to acknowledge Doctor—I am calling him

Doctor—but the Honorable Steve Murdock, having rooted himself

in Texas with a great deal of collaboration with a number of my

constituents and certainly one of our distinguished Senators, Senator Rodney Ellis and Senator Royce West, two distinguished State

Senators.

And might I acknowledge as well the witness on panel two but

particularly the president of a distinguished sorority, Dr. Barbara

A. McKinzie of Alpha Kappa Alpha, for her presence here today in

commemoration of this outstanding celebration to take place this

week.

Quickly, I want to acknowledge the fact that we do not serve if

we cannot count, and it is important for the Census Bureau to recognize that it must be based upon the rooted people in communities. Familiarity does not breed content when you are knocking

on the doors of neighbors and asking them to be counted.

I want to associate myself with my friend and colleague, Congresswoman Clarke. Having experienced the abusiveness of ICE

raids proliferating across America in substitute of comprehensive

immigration reform, I know that populations of African Americans,

Hispanics and Asians will be frightened from the very presence of

a government entity coming to their door. So we must find a way

to balance the needs of this country to establish who it is.

Last, let me say that although I congratulate our Majority Whip

for the funding that we already see in census, let me ask Mr.

Murdock to be forthright and truthful on the needs of resources.

You cannot advertise on a thimble amount of money. You cannot

outreach on a thimble amount of money. You cannot get those individuals who are willing to work on a thimble amount of money.

And so, we want to hear from you, to speak up, so that we can

be in the fight together.

I think there should be policy changes, Mr. Chairman, and I

would like to see that students are counted where they live. I

would like to see people incarcerated counted where they live with

their grandmama.

But in any event, let me conclude and thank the chairman. I look

forward to the witnesses’ testimony. Our goal is to empower America, to empower America by knowledge, by the count and by people

being taken care of.

I yield back my time.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much, Ms. Jackson-Lee.

Just for everyone to know, we will recess at the end of the opening statements and then reconvene after the votes.

Ms. Lee of California.

Ms. LEE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I know we only

have a few minutes before votes. So I will be very brief, but let me

just thank you and our Majority Whip for these hearings and for

being ahead of the curve and, hopefully, be able to get some answers today.

This is a very challenging census, we all know. Issues such as

the foreclosures crisis, the ICE raids, formerly incarcerated individuals, all of those issues provide an even greater challenge this

time.

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Also, I hope we can figure out what happened to the additional

$200 million plus that was appropriated and that there is a plan

to utilize those resources in an effective way to make sure that all

of our undercounted communities are counted.

I came in 1998, so this is my second census here in the Congress.

Congresswoman Carrie Meek led us last time in a very important

effort which was very robust, and I know this time under your

leadership, Mr. Clay, we will make sure that each and every individual is counted.

Thank you again.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much, Ms. Lee, and we look forward to

your participation in this process.

I now will recognize the Chair of the CBC, Ms. Carolyn Kilpatrick of Michigan and thank you so much for participating in the

hearing.

Ms. KILPATRICK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to commend you and the subcommittee for having this hearing.

This is probably the most important census for all of the reasons

my colleagues have already mentioned, and I am honored to be a

part of it and will be with you between meetings all afternoon.

Thank you.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much.

The subcommittee will stand in recess and reconvene at the end

of these votes. I would estimate about a half an hour. Thank you.

[Recess.]

Mr. CLAY. The subcommittee will come to order. We will resume

the hearing.

When we left, we were on opening statements. If there are no

opening statements—Ms. Watson, would you care to make an opening?

Take your time. Get comfortable. Have a seat.

Representative Watson is recognized for her opening statement.

Ms. WATSON. Mr. Chairman, I appreciate this hearing where we

will examine the Census Bureau’s plan to use the 2010 integrated

communications campaign to help ensure that hard to count communities are not disproportionately undercounted.

It is very, very important as we go into 2010 that we follow the

guidelines in this integrated program. It is very comprehensive,

and it would strike a nationwide campaign that will use advertising, media relations, specific events and other aspects of marketing

and communication to reach diverse audiences.

We are so concerned. I represent a district in California, the largest State and the first State in the Union to become a majority of

minorities. Within my own district, I have a large number of Armenians, Greeks, Pacific Islanders, Hispanics. I have all of

Koreatown.

What usually happens is that people who are in the country got

to where their loved ones and friends are living with the fear that

comes along with ICE and the raids and all. You don’t get an accurate count.

So what I usually do is I call in the regional census director and

explain to them how to get a more accurate count. You know go

to the playgrounds on a Sunday after church. Go to the parking

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lots. Families like to get out with their children. So what we are

doing is keeping an eye on how we get our people counted.

We are concerned about the budget which is $212 million, and

we were informed that only $27 million will go to track Blacks,

Hispanics and so on. So we want to be sure that the economically

disadvantaged, which is the hardest to count group, and nearly 50

percent of the population in this category is Black and one-third

speaks a language other than English.

And so, the ethnic enclaves, this is the second highest hard to

count group: 62 percent are foreign born, 34 percent are linguistically isolated and 54 percent speak Spanish, 20 percent speak a

language other than English.

Now our concern is that the preparation for the 2010 census and

what their plans are to reduce the undercount. Additional concerns

are related to the cost overruns within other census operations and

will they impact on funding for the communications campaign.

Also, we are concerned about the DraftFCB officials, that officials

have expressed a need for $68 million more to conduct a communications campaign that is comparable to the 2000 campaign. Despite anticipated enumeration challenges within hard to count communities, the proposed budget for minority outreach within the

campaign has been significantly decreased.

So, Mr. Chairman and our presenters this evening, I am looking

very forward to hearing what you have to present to us and have

you answer questions about our concerns.

I come from an urban district. I mentioned the mix there, and

I mentioned the fact—I think I did—that we usually have a 10 percent undercount. That has been historically the case. The 33rd District, my district in Los Angeles, has 50 percent of its population

that speaks a language other than English. So we have to take that

into account.

We are going to be watching closely, but I again will call in the

regional director and help give that person guidance as to how to

do a better count.

With that, I will give back and thank you very much for the

time, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much, Ms. Watson, and we appreciate

your vigilance on this issue of the census and your diversity of your

district.

If there are no other further opening statements, we will now

take testimony from the witnesses.

It is the policy of this committee to swear in all witnesses before

they testify. Would you please stand and raise your right hands?

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mr. CLAY. Let the record reflect that the witnesses answered in

the affirmative.

I ask each witness now give a brief summary of their testimony.

Please limit your summary to 5 minutes, and your complete written statement will be included in the hearing record.

Dr. Murdock, thank you for being here. You may start it off.

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STATEMENTS OF STEVEN H. MURDOCK, DIRECTOR, BUREAU

OF THE CENSUS, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE; AND

JEFF TARAKAJIAN, EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT, CLIENT

SERVICES, DRAFTFCB

STATEMENT OF STEVEN H. MURDOCK

Mr. MURDOCK. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to talk to you about the Census Bureau’s integrated communications plan for the 2010 census.

The 2010 census communications campaign builds on the success

of the census 2000 partnership and marketing campaign which

helped to reverse a two-decade decline in the national response

rate. The objectives of the 2010 program, as in 2000, are to increase mail response, reduce the differential undercount and improve overall accuracy and improve public cooperation with enumerators.

In your letter of invitation, you mentioned the communications

contract, the Partnership Program and Census in Schools. Each of

these is an important component of the overall communications

plan for the 2010 census. None of them can be fully successful on

their own.

The communications campaign will be integrated with the Census Bureau’s decennial census operations, the Partnership Program, Census in Schools, national and local media and public relations activities to ensure that consistent messages are delivered

and reinforced at every stage of the process. Success of each component is vital to achieving a complete and accurate count.

In September 2007, the Census Bureau awarded its 2010 communications contract to DraftFCB. DraftFCB is a full service marketing communications agency that will team with other companies

that specialize in reaching minority audiences.

There are two components to the media outreach effort. Using

the expertise of DraftFCB, the Census Bureau will mount a national media campaign in every broadcast medium to promote our

messaging for 2010. We will advertise on network television and

radio, sporting events like the NFL, local and cable television, ethnic programming and the Internet.

The second key component of the media campaign will focus on

specific minority populations. Ethnic media advertising will complement the national campaign, bringing the message to hard to

count populations.

Each of DraftFCB’s contractors has proven experience reaching

their target communities, and their efforts will be instrumental in

addressing the differential undercount.

The Partnership Program is another key component of our communications program. Our partners who have great credibility in

their communities will vouch for the importance of completing the

2010 census to people in inner cities, on Indian reservations and

rural America and other areas. This will be particularly important

in areas isolated by language and/or geography.

Our Partnership materials will be available in multiple languages, and they will be customizable so that partners can tailor

the message to their specific communities.

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Unlike census 2000, when promotional materials were only available through a Census Bureau partnership specialist, 2010 materials will be easily accessed through the Internet or as printed

copy. We also provide needed resources to committed partner organizations, through the Partnership Support Program as we did in

2000.

The Census in Schools Programs is another key component of the

integrated communications plan. The program of 2010 will focus on

educating children on the importance of participating in the census.

The goal is to develop strategies, materials and messages to reach

parents through their children. The current plan provides for a program directed at hard to count areas for grades K through 6.

DraftFCB is in the process of awarding a competitive contract to

an experienced educational marketing firm to help implement a

strategy with the Census Bureau.

Another initiative, a language program, will also focus on the

hard to reach populations. For the first time, we will mail about

13 million bilingual Spanish-English questionnaires targeted to

areas with concentrations of Hispanic population. Questionnaires

will be available in five languages in addition to English, and we

will provide language assistance guides in more than 50 languages.

The 2010 census campaign integrates all elements to provide better branding of the 2010 census among all segments of the population, improved delivery of promotional materials for regional and

national partnership efforts, a concerted time-specific delivery plan

and provide clear and accurate messaging.

The communications contract has a total life cycle budget of $212

million. This is in addition to funds provided for our regional and

national partnership programs. We are currently working with

DraftFCB on the budget associated with the various components of

our integrated communications plan.

Importantly, budgets for the Partnership Program and the communications contract have not been compromised or reduced to

meet the budgetary requirements of the FDCA contract. Unlike any

of the Census Bureau other major 2010 contracts, the communications contract must be flexible. Our ability to react quickly to the

fast-changing media environments in 2010 will be a key to an effective and wide-reaching outreach campaign.

The integrated communications plan is being developed with active input from our stakeholders around the country and throughout the Census Bureau.

We consider the plan and the budget to be a blueprint that will

evolve to optimize our resources. We will review and adjust the

program throughout the census to ensure that our resources are

applied where they are needed most.

In closing, let me stress that the communications program is of

vital importance to the Census Bureau and to me. We are counting

on Congress, our advisory committees and our partnership organizations to work with us to identify improvements and to ensure the

program meets the needs of communities they know best.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify. I will be happy to answer any questions you may have.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Murdock follows:]

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Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much, Dr. Murdock, and thank you for

your leadership at the Census Bureau.

Also, a witness on this panel is Jeff Tarakajian, executive vice

president of Client Services for DraftFCB, the contractor for the

2010 integrated communications campaign.

Mr. Tarakajian, you may proceed for 5 minutes.

STATEMENT OF JEFF TARAKAJIAN

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the subcommittee. DraftFCB and our subcontractor partners thank you for

the opportunity to talk to you today about the integrated communications plan for the 2010 census.

Today, I am accompanied by Laura Marella, vice chairman of

GlobalHue Latino, our Hispanic partner; Mostapha Saout, president of Allied Media; Kevin Williams, senior VP/group director at

GlobalHue; and Peter DeNunzio, president of DraftFCB New York.

During the last 8 months, our subcontractors and ourselves have

spent considerable time and focus learning about the 2000 campaign, the mood of the Nation and its potential impact on 2010 as

well as the needs and recommendations of key stakeholders for the

2010 effort.

In that quest for learning, our subcontractor partners and ourselves have visited with the census regional offices. We have heard

the insights and recommendations of the various advisory committees and, importantly, we have conducted primary research and

analyzed reams of existing studies.

Learning will be ongoing and continue to guide everything we do

to build a successful 2010 census overall and to reduce the

undercount. In fact, learning will guide the campaign throughout

its life cycle, allowing for the first time real-time adjustments to

the effort to maximize response.

But, right now, we have a plan that is a work in progress. It is

a blueprint. Its structure is a solid foundation of mass media to

motivate mass participation with substantial overlays targeted to

race and ethnic populations, focused on the hard to count. But, importantly, it is an integrated approach that follows best practices

in our industry and incorporates recommendations from the very

successful 2000 campaign.

We have a time line that tracks through the key stages where

we develop creative materials and media plans for all audiences,

evaluate the research among its intended audience the materials

that will appear in the marketplace and provide ample occasions

and time for stakeholder review and input.

The process is iterative, and it is cumulative. Right now, it is on

schedule, and it is on budget.

We invite oversight and input because it will make the campaign

better. But, as a result of creating and implementing countless

similar marketing and communications campaigns, we also know

what we must do and when we must do it. It has all been planned.

With the census, we also know there is no second chance. No

delays are possible. So we will deliver a campaign that is on time,

on budget as well as on point.

While we can’t show you yet how the materials will look or what

the specific plans that each audience will be comprised of or even

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how much will be spent on each audience, we can give you an idea

of the experience a real person will have from the integrated campaign as he goes through his daily life.

Meet Derran. He is a 27-year-old single Black mobile which is a

traditionally undercounted audience. He lives in Philadelphia.

The 2010 census will be his very first. It is a low priority in his

life. He grew up in an environment that was cynical about government. He will be reached by the mass media campaign and the

Black audience campaign.

Very importantly, as we get to know him, we will discover that

beginning in 2009 he will begin to see messages about the census,

for example, in his barbershop when they start talking about census jobs, on Facebook where he reconnects with a buddy of his,

through historically Black colleges and newspapers, at the Linc

where the Eagles play in Philadelphia, on a billboard on the

Schuylkill Expressway, at a Black History Month event in Center

City, during a March Madness telecast, at church and on Grey’s

Anatomy, etc.

Beginning in 2009 and peaking in 2010 around the mailings,

messaging about the census will surround us, building awareness,

educating and encouraging participation.

We can also give you a glimpse of some other work we have completed so far: interim materials for partnerships and recruitment

communications to reach people about census jobs in their communities.

Our work has just begun. Our entire team looks forward to the

discussions, challenges, debates, the back and forths, the late

nights and weekends we will spend designing and implementing

what we want to be the most successful campaign yet.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak about this most important work that we are doing. I am very happy to answer any questions you may have.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Tarakajian follows:]

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Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much.

We will begin questioning, and I will defer to Ms. Watson and

any other Members, and then I will do the final round of questioning.

Ms. Watson, do you have questions?

Ms. WATSON. I understand that you are going to be subcontracting. You have affiliates by regions throughout. How will you monitor those?

As you said, Mr. Murdock, that you get one chance at this. I

guess both of you had said that. How do we monitor? How are we

sure that we can go back and be sure we can have some kind of

accuracy in the process?

I mean how are you going to work on a regional basis with your

subcontractors?

Mr. MURDOCK. Let me answer first, and then him answer from

his subcontractors.

We have a management program for every grant or contract we

have with people that are assigned to administer and to create

metrics and other factors to be used to assess how well our contractors are doing.

For example, we have a certain. We have goals set up for our

contracts relative to small and disadvantaged businesses, and they

have a goal, and they receive greater awards if they meet those

goals relative to that kind of issue. But we have a whole set of factors by which we assess how well they are doing and what and

therefore can take remedial actions when necessary.

Ms. WATSON. I guess, Karen Narasaki, OK. She is the executive

director of the Asian American Justice Center, testified before the

subcommittee last year that the Bureau needed to improve its work

on language translations, and she noted that in 2000 the Bureau

was late in making critical decisions on translation materials and

that there was no centralized clearinghouse of translated materials.

I have that problem in my district.

To what do you attribute the problems and what has the Bureau

done to resolve them on this round?

Mr. MURDOCK. Well, in 2000, we had really very separate programs, one that was a media and advertising program and then

our Partnership program, and the Census Bureau provided most of

the materials that went out in printed form.

The integrated part of this contract is to bring those together so

that materials are available when they are needed by groups that

may want to promote the census, by our partnership specialists

who need to pass those out to groups that need them for promotion

and need to help their members understand the census.

So what has changed and changed significantly is that we have

an integrated program with all of the timing phased out and set

out so that we will be much more certain that we will not have the

problems we had in timing because we did have problems.

We had problems with materials being way too, well, actually too

late in terms of meeting the needs that we had, and that is one

of the reasons we went to an integrated program that integrated

the advertising, the media part of this program with the Partnership Program.

Ms. WATSON. Are you assured that you will have like kind?

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I find you are more effective when you go in to do the outreach

in non-English speaking communities, that you have someone that

speaks the language, looks like them, has some recognition in the

community. So are you monitoring to see that the enumerators

then match the demographics?

Mr. MURDOCK. Both in terms of hiring enumerators and particularly as we talk about the Partnership Program, this group of

about 680 people that we will have across the country. Their very

purpose is to get involvement of local community people, religious

leaders, elected officials, others who people know that can help to

spread the message that it is safe to respond to the census because

we know very well anyone coming from the outside has much less

credibility to me or to anyone than someone you have known and

who can.

When that face that you know says this is something that you

should do, this is something important for our community, it has

a much greater meaning than someone who is not familiar to the

person, and that is really the basis of a lot of the success of our

Partnership Program.

Ms. WATSON. I want to thank you, Mr. Murdock, for coming to

the CPC yesterday. As I mentioned to you, I have all of Koreatown

in my district in Los Angeles. It is the largest Korean community

in the country. And so, can you tell us about the funding?

You mentioned the funding for African Americans and other minorities, probably from African islands and so on. So how much

funding is being allocated, if you can share that with us, to reach

people in these Asian communities?

Mr. MURDOCK. Well, the final distribution of that is still being

worked out by the contractor FCB and the subcontractors. Some of

the initial work that we had showed about a $76 million general

media. I mean group-wide kind of advertising campaign, meaning

it was for the generalized population.

On top of that, because I think it is important to understand that

we are really talking about kind of a layering of the messages, one

is there is a general media campaign that should appeal to populations of all different groups, and then we do have specific subcontractors as my friend here on the left indicated that try specifically to look at different populations.

The most recent data I have seen, and this is not definitive because it is still being finalized because our plan for this program

is just now being finalized. We had a draft plan earlier. We asked

for revisions of that, and now we are getting a more definitive plan.

It showed about 27 million, for example, for Black and Hispanic

audiences, about 13 for Asian audiences, about 6 for American Indian and Alaskan Native, about 2.8 million for Puerto Rico, etc. We

can provide that information to you.

Ms. WATSON. Good. I was going to ask if we have or can have

another opportunity to hear about and be briefed on the final draft

and then have input.

Mr. MURDOCK. Certainly. Certainly.

Ms. WATSON. The other suggestion I would like to make, and this

will be the last question or suggestion, is that regionally you meet

with some of the minority representatives, have your regional peoVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:55 Mar 24, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00062 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\47524.TXT KATIE PsN: KATIE
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ple, so that we can have this whole process more localized, and we

will have input.

I think our churches could be very, very helpful. In the Los Angeles area that I represent, we have the mega churches with 30,000

membership, and one Sunday you could reach maybe as many as

500,000 people in an announcement. So if you could have your regional people meet with us, we could be very helpful to you.

With that, I thank you, Mr. Chairman, for the time.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you, Ms. Watson. Very good suggestions.

Mr. MURDOCK. We would welcome that involvement.

Mr. CLAY. Very good.

Mr. Gonzalez, you are recognized for 5 minutes for questioning.

Mr. GONZALEZ. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Dr. Murdock, there are some areas that concern me in my opening statement. I am not even going to get into some of those because we have some limited time.

My concern is the diversion of funds. I think we are all committed to adequately funding. There are some issues about certain requests being made and how we get the money to you, but I think

that is all going to be resolved.

But looking to the future and what you are going to be utilizing,

implementing, I guess I want some assurance that some of the

things you may be looking at will not take funds away from the efforts that Mr. Tarakajian is attempting to do through the integrated communications program and so on.

Let’s just start off with we talk about the Internet, using the

Internet. I know Mr. Tarakajian referenced it as a way of communicating the existence and the awareness of the Internet and not

necessarily using the Internet as a method to respond or report or

fill out whatever is necessary in the way of compliance with the request from the Census Bureau of our citizens or non-citizens, whoever is out there.

So there is a distinction, is there not?

Mr. MURDOCK. Yes.

Mr. GONZALEZ. Mr. Tarakajian is talking about really just a

means of communicating with the Internet, Facebook, MySpace,

whatever it is. Then I also want to talk about exactly what that

arrangement is and make a suggestion or two. But there has been

discussion about the use of the Internet, and I don’t know whether

that has come out of the Senate or not.

What does that involve? What are we talking about and at what

stage of development or consideration do we find ourselves today?

Mr. MURDOCK. Well, as part of our replan effort, we have relooked at the option of providing the Internet as an option for response. Let me make it very clear that we have not finalized our

analysis of that, and we are diverting no decennial funds at this

time toward that process.

The work that we are doing now is by our IT division which is

funded out of another part of the Census Bureau, and what we are

looking at is simply this as another alternative that we can provide

to people or potentially can provide. When we get done with the

analysis, we will be glad to come back and report that.

Let me say something about what you said at the beginning.

There has been, since I came here at least, no diversion of funds

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from this set of enterprises. I will be willing to commit to all of you

here that, to the best of my power, there will be no diversion from

these two programs.

As you know, Representative, I was in Texas for nearly 30 years

working in this area. I very strongly believe in this program. I saw

the programs, the Partnership Program, etc. work very effectively

in Texas. I saw it work in the colonias of south Texas and increase

the response rates not to a perfect level but to a level that was certainly much better than what we had had in previous censuses.

So there are no plans, and I commit to you that I have no plans

for sure to take resources away from this program. I think it is a

very important program, very critical to the census.

Mr. GONZALEZ. I appreciate that there won’t be the diversion or

whatever. It does add an additional layer of funding. There is no

doubt about that.

And so, I am just going as to cost-benefit analysis of whatever

you are going to be doing as you contemplate something else,

whether it is the Internet or whether it is a sweepstakes. I am just

concerned about those two.

Mr. MURDOCK. Let me make it very clear about those because

there has been a lot of misunderstanding about the both of those.

There has been work about incentive programs. Where those are is

we have provided to the Department of Commerce our previous

analysis that was done in previous censuses. They are looking at

this at the Department of Commerce.

We are diverting no resources at this time and have no plans at

this time to have anything related to incentives, sweepstakes and

all the other things that have sometimes been covered in the papers.

The Internet will be provided if it is feasible, if it does not mean

the deterioration in things such as this program and if we find out

that it might in fact help us in some circumstances if we have some

kind of crisis and need to provide another way for some people to

respond to the census. We are not diverting resources from any

part of the decennial and particularly not from this program to look

at either of these.

Mr. GONZALEZ. I know it is a sensitive topic, but I think that Majority Whip Clyburn referred to it. I think Congresswoman Watson

referred to it. That is if the real objective here is greater participation, we know that in this universe of responders that we have a

certain segment or sector that we really don’t have much of a problem with.

It is really the effort and the concentration of moneys and effort

and everything else is really in two other categories that Congresswoman Watson had already referenced: economically disadvantaged and the ethnic enclave too.

I venture to guess that the advantaged homeowners which have

the lowest hard to count score, 6, and the highest mail return rate,

83 percent, is probably that particular audience that you would be

reaching if in fact you invest any substantial funds in the Internet.

I mean that is the way the real world works. I am just saying I

would hate to get diverted to it.

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I love the Internet. We try to utilize it to the extent that we can,

but I just don’t really feel that the amount of attention or funds

would be a diversion.

And let me go further as to the reason that we think it could be

counterproductive. It is just not the undercount. It is the overcount,

and Whip Clyburn made reference to that. There are two ways that

this thing works against the communities of color: undercounted,

also overcounted.

I think there is real danger on the Internet responses in making

it even harder for you guys to figure if there is actually double and

triple reporting.

Mr. Chairman, I know I have gone over my time, and I am hoping that we might have an occasion after this round to maybe have

a couple of questions afterwards if you would.

Mr. CLAY. We will have time for another round.

Mr. MURDOCK. Let me just assure, Representative Gonzalez, that

we are not going to proceed with anything that endangers our ability to get a full and complete count.

You know there are two things we worry about. We worry about

the accuracy of the count, which is its completeness, and the timeliness of the census. Nothing we are going to do is going to endanger

either of those.

We won’t do something that makes the risk of getting a late census or getting a less accurate census. We are just not going to do

that.

Thank you so much.

Mr. GONZALEZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you, Mr. Gonzalez.

Representative Clarke, you are recognized for 5 minutes.

Ms. CLARKE. Thank very much, Mr. Chair.

Dr. Murdock, I have a couple of questions, and let me just start

with my concern around a PR effort that would rely heavily on the

insight that Black audiences are highly influenced by word of

mouth. I don’t know what types of focus groups or studies you did

to complete to support this conclusion or what types of nontraditional media forms will be used. So maybe you can give us some

insight into that.

But what is your plan to reach Blacks in rural areas?

Mr. MURDOCK. Well, in many parts of the country, rural areas

are uniquely challenging because of the sparsity of population and

because of lots of other issues that are sometimes involved.

Our Partnership Program is not just one that works in large cities. It is one that works in rural areas as well. The intent of that

program is to go particularly to hard to count areas, to become involved with the population, with organizations, with churches, with

community groups, with elected officials, all with the intent of increasing awareness and involving local people in the census.

One of the things that Representative Watson said that is very,

very true is that local involvement is critical. What we try to do

with our Partnership Program is not to have a partner come in and

take the census, not to have that person come in and substitute for

local people, but in fact to work with local people, to empower the

local people to get involved in the census because that is the census

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works when people believe in it and people get involved in it, and

that is a local phenomena as much as anything else.

Ms. CLARKE. So, Dr. Murdock, in terms of a PR effort, are you

expecting that the influence of word of mouth, I guess the repetition, would gain the type of affinity with filling out the census?

I am just trying to get a sense because word of mouth can work

both ways, right?

Mr. MURDOCK. Right.

Ms. CLARKE. OK. So?

Mr. MURDOCK. If you don’t mind, let me ask Mr. Tarakajian to

go ahead and talk about the particular strategies they are using.

Ms. CLARKE. Sure. OK.

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. Actually, the insight or the strategy about word

of mouth being important to the Black community came from our

GlobalHue partner as one of the insights that they brought to the

table about the Black community.

I believe that what they are talking about is that there are certain segments of the population that are much more influenced by

person to person communications than by mass media communications. The value of that person to person communication where

there is an affinity, a relationship created is very critical. That is

really the only way to get certain segments of the population to

overcome their fears and to feel comfortable responding.

Ms. CLARKE. How does that jibe with accuracy because oftentimes word of mouth is inaccurate and, if that is used as a strategy, is it your layering approach that you have talked about in

your presentation along with word of mouth?

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. Yes.

Ms. CLARKE. I am just concerned that we would see that as a

linchpin for getting people to sign up in the census particularly in

light of the climate that we live in with regard to the invasiveness

of government.

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. Yes. Word of mouth is not the strategy of the

campaign. It is one tactic among many tactics that we will use.

As I said, it is something that for certain segments of the population is very important because mass media or third party messages don’t really motivate them because they don’t necessarily

trust the third party. But a personal message that is generated

from someone that they trust carries much more weight and carries

much more meaning and motivation for them.

Ms. CLARKE. Given the fact that 8 percent of the total Black population is born outside of the United States, I notice that Creole is

the only foreign language in which messages will be created for the

Black community. Why aren’t any continental African languages

included such as Swahili or a universal language such as French?

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. The language program is more robust really

than the languages that are going to appear in paid media. There

14 languages that would be part of the paid media campaign.

There are another five languages that would be for promotional

materials.

But very importantly, in addition to that, all of the partnership

promotional materials will be created in what we would call a template form so that all of the partners who are watching out for the

audiences that speak a language other than those in the campaign

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will be able to take those templates and translate them into whatever language is necessary. So, really what we are doing is being

able to open it up to virtually any language that anybody needs for

those kinds of materials.

Ms. CLARKE. I just wanted to sort of bring, because my time is

winding down, to your attention that you are talking about layered

communities in terms of the challenge it is to get information to

them. We know already that for people in the Black community, in

particular, Black males, you have been under-reporting. Imagine if

that Black male spoke another language, what the challenge would

be in really getting to that individual.

So I just wanted you to be aware of all of those nuances and intricacies as you go about rolling out your PR strategy. There is

going to be some overlay, but you want to make sure that it also

hits its target.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Mr. MURDOCK. Let me just comment.

Mr. CLAY. Yes, you may.

Mr. MURDOCK. In terms of the languages and in terms of the

total number of languages available, there will be over 50, and

Swahili is one of the languages for which there are language

guides.

So, in terms of the overall program, obviously we cannot provide

in every language that now prevails with the groups in the United

States. We are trying our best, and we are doing over 50 different

languages, and Swahili is one of them.

Mr. CLAY. Representative Kilpatrick, you are recognized for 5

minutes.

Ms. KILPATRICK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you again for

having us this afternoon.

Dr. Murdock, we talked a bit yesterday, and since then we have

met with the full Democratic Caucus. I submit to you, to a person,

all 233 of us are looking forward to working closely with the Census Department to get an accurate census.

We believe it will be more difficult than ever before in terms of

the lives of Americans when things are happening and that we

want to be your partners as we get a correct count that affects all

of our districts, all of our dollars and serves the United States of

America.

Mr. MURDOCK. We appreciate that.

Ms. KILPATRICK. I serve on the House Appropriations Committee.

About two or 3 weeks ago, we passed a supplemental in the House

and the Senate, and the President has now signed it. It gives the

census an additional $210 million.

One of the problems we didn’t get a chance to talk about yesterday but the handheld $600 million computers that have been

tossed somewhere and now going to paper as we did 10 years ago.

It is unfortunate, first of all.

The contract that went to that company, I understand a Florida

company, some $600 plus million. You only had five or six questions that they were supposed to input. Why were they thrown out?

In their proposal, did they not say they could meet the challenge?

Were you not clear in what you were asking?

64

The $210 million, to my understanding, is going to help with

some enumeration, but this is a tech society. If they were not able

with the handhelds to connect to a mainframe to print out what

we needed, why was this company chosen?

Mr. MURDOCK. I think, ma’am, let me clarify a couple things.

Ms. KILPATRICK. Please.

Mr. MURDOCK. First of all, we are using handhelds in the address canvassing part of our program. What I think the confusion

was is that part of our process is after we have received all of the

mail responses, and then we have something we call non-response

followup, and that is when we start knocking door to door.

We did a very careful analysis, a very sobering analysis that suggested to us that where we were at that point in time, the risks

would be significant to stay with trying to do, use handhelds in

NRFU.

Ms. KILPATRICK. That is added expense?

Mr. MURDOCK. That is the non-response followup. So we are

using handhelds in the address canvassing. Address canvassing is

a very key part of the census.

Ms. KILPATRICK. We are not arguing. We are not arguing. I know

the process.

Mr. MURDOCK. OK.

Ms. KILPATRICK. I am 60. So I have been through at least four

of them, right. That is very important. Technology is new, and it

has been tested and tried for a long time. The truth of the matter is Census spent $600 plus million.

Mr. MURDOCK. No.

Ms. KILPATRICK. No? Help me out. Don’t tell me the process. Tell

me about the money.

Mr. MURDOCK. OK. We have spent funds on that project, but the

$600 million was for the total contract if it included the NRFU part

of the process. So we have not spent $600 million.

Ms. KILPATRICK. How much have you spent, sir?

Mr. MURDOCK. We have spent, I think, about $240 million, something like that. We can check and get you an exact number.

Ms. KILPATRICK. $240 million on a machine we can’t use?

Mr. MURDOCK. No. We can use the machine on the addressing

canvassing, ma’am. That is what I am trying. The address canvassing is critical because the census is actually a census of addresses

from which we get households from which we identify people.

This process will allow us to identify those addresses, to input

them electronically, to get GPS coordinates for those programs that

will allow us to make sure that we know exactly where each location is.

Ms. KILPATRICK. OK. My time is short.

Mr. MURDOCK. We are using.

Ms. KILPATRICK. So the $240 that we spent, are they still getting

260 more, the same company or is that the end of their contract?

Mr. MURDOCK. We are in the process of replan. We will be receiving from the contractor a proposal or cost proposal tomorrow, and

then we will. On the 15th, I am sorry. We will then be negotiating

with them for the additional parts of the process that they will be

doing.

Ms. KILPATRICK. More dollars?

65

Mr. MURDOCK. They are doing operational control systems.

Ms. KILPATRICK. You know you are talking over my head in

terms of the technical.

Mr. MURDOCK. I am sorry.

Ms. KILPATRICK. You know money, stay right there, in the program.

Mr. MURDOCK. OK.

Ms. KILPATRICK. We will get to that too because we want to be

a part of it, but I am trying to understand. In a contract that started out at $600 million, we have only spent $240, is that right?

Mr. MURDOCK. At this point, yes.

Ms. KILPATRICK. It is my understanding that those computers

that we bought are not longer useful? If it is wrong, just say, no,

that is not right.

Mr. MURDOCK. No, that is not right.

Ms. KILPATRICK. OK. Then come on, you can say; 5 minutes and

we are catching planes. Thursday is a bad day for hearings, but it

was important for us to be here to try to begin the conversation,

and we want to continue. But we need the correct information.

As we said yesterday, if you would supply it to us because we

don’t believe everything we read in the paper either. But unless we

hear from the real source, and you are that source here, Dr.

Murdock, we have to go with what we hear. What we are hearing

is that we spent $610 million and that company is about to get another billion and they didn’t complete the first assignment.

Mr. MURDOCK. That is not correct.

Ms. KILPATRICK. OK.

Mr. MURDOCK. We are negotiating the contract for their remaining from now. That will be completed by August 15th. I can’t tell

you exactly what that is, but it is not going to be in the range of

$1 billion more.

Ms. KILPATRICK. Did they fulfill the first obligation?

Mr. MURDOCK. Pardon?

Ms. KILPATRICK. Did they fulfill the first obligation?

Mr. MURDOCK. That process is still being done, and they are

working to complete. It was not supposed to be done at this point

in time. They are making progress on that.

Ms. KILPATRICK. So, they have been smeared unjustly, it sounds

like to me.

Mr. MURDOCK. Well, there were problems on both sides. As we

said in previous testimony, there were problems on our part in

terms of providing as clear requirements as we might have. There

were also difficulties in the performance of the handhelds that they

are addressing now, and we had problems with handhelds that

didn’t operate correctly and didn’t operate in the way that we needed them to. That is being addressed.

Ms. KILPATRICK. Last question, was that a competitive bid and

were there other companies bidding for it?

Mr. MURDOCK. Absolutely. Absolutely, it was a competitive bid.

Ms. KILPATRICK. We look forward to working with you.

Mr. MURDOCK. Thank you.

Ms. KILPATRICK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much, Madam Chair.

66

Dr. Murdock, DraftFCB officials claim they need an additional $68 million to conduct a communications campaign that is comparable to the 2000 campaign. They believe the current budget of

$207 million does not take into account several factors including

media inflation that is predicted to be a minimum of 35 percent,

the increasing degree of difficulty caused by a more diverse population, continuing fragmentation of the media marketplace and declining response rates. Does the Bureau believe the $207 million is sufficient to conduct

a communications campaign that significantly reduces the

undercount and, if so, how? If not, why and how does the Bureau

plan to address these deficiencies?

Mr. MURDOCK. We believe that $212. Now understand when we

look at this full program, there is the communications part of it,

which is $212 million, and then there are partnership programs

that are not included in that $212 million.

We believe what we have is sufficient for where we are at this

point in the process, but let me tell you that this is an evolving

process. It is one that we are now just finalizing the plans.

If in the course of the process we see that we need to look at alternatives, we will be back and cooperating with Commerce, with

you as stakeholders and others. We will look at what we need to

do to obtain appropriate resources for this program.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you for that response.

According to the Bureau’s estimates, it undercounted African

Americans by 628,000, Hispanics by 248,000, Hawaiian or Pacific

Islanders by 13,000 and the American Indian and Native Alaskans

by 10,000. There are some in the statistical community who believe

the actual undercounts are much higher.

Please tell us the Bureau’s specific plans for reducing the

undercount, given the fact that you will not have the handheld

computing devices to conduct non-response followup and you have

lowered your response rate.

Mr. MURDOCK. The handhelds are not really that significant as

you look at the response rate. That is we are going to be doing a

program that we did last time that gave us the most successful

census ever which was a paper-based non-response followup. This

is a data collection effort, and it is necessarily substantially improved in terms of accuracy as a result of the use of the handheld.

Mr. CLAY. OK.

Mr. Tarakajian, has the Bureau or Commerce Department asked

DraftFCB to set aside funds for the sweepstakes?

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. No.

Mr. CLAY. No? They haven’t approached you about it all and you

all have not set aside funds?

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. No. They haven’t asked us to, and we have not

done that.

Mr. CLAY. And you don’t plan on doing it?

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. No.

Mr. CLAY. OK. All right. I will recognize Ms. Jackson-Lee for 5

minutes.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Let me ask Mr. Murdock, and this may have been asked answered, but please don’t hesitate to expand on your answer.

67

When we were in an earlier meeting, you spoke to us about the

partnership which I think has a great deal of value to it, partnership specialists, but our recollection is that they were thinly spread

in the past census. And so, my question is do you intend to expand

that program extensively?

Where do you intend to hire from for those particular individuals

who will reach out to different partners? Do you have a plan to recruit these partners from the under-served, under-utilized areas?

Mr. MURDOCK. Well, let me begin by saying that we will have

about the same number as we had in 2000. That is about 680 to

690 persons.

They are recruited by our regions, in our regions. Throughout

those regions, what is attempted, we attempt to do is find people

from individual communities, from areas within the region that

represent different ethnic and other kinds of groups, racial groups,

and to get them hired to be part of the Partnership program because we do know that what works best in terms of getting responses is people from local areas that people identify, that people

come to trust and know that they are part of their communities

and they understand the context from which they are responding

to the census or any other matters.

We recruit locally, and our regions, our regional directors are

charged with ensuring that we represent the groups in their regions.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Mr. Murdock, is that solely budget-directed or

is there a chain of command where the Secretary of Commerce is

aware of the efforts and has indicated that 680, 690 is what we

need?

Mr. MURDOCK. No, that was not. That was decided in a planning

effort by the Census Bureau. It was not decided by the Department

of Commerce.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Well, let me just suggest are you saying that

is the number for the Nation?

Mr. MURDOCK. For the Nation, yes, ma’am.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Well, the GAO indicated that you were thinly,

that you were stretched pretty far in 2000. If we are going to up

the numbers of the undercount and you, yourself, have indicated

that these are effective tools, wouldn’t it be appropriate to represent to the Census Bureau to go back and reconsider that number?

Here we are, 10 years later, and we have under 1,000 in terms

of community partners in a Nation that is 300 million plus?

Mr. MURDOCK. Well, understand that we are not talking about

community partners. We are talking about specialists working to

do that.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Absolutely.

Mr. MURDOCK. OK. I am sorry.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Absolutely, and I appreciate what you are saying. I absolutely know that.

If you are encouraging elected officials, non-profits and interested

persons to go out and find as many community partners as possible, then those specialists who are outreaching to them certainly,

I believe, need to be an increased number.

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I would ask your consideration for that and tell me what the procedure is. If the Census Bureau made that determination, what is

the basis of reconsidering and upping the numbers?

Mr. MURDOCK. What I said in just, I think, a moment before you

came in, ma’am was that this is a program which is simply starting, which is simply beginning. We are in the planning stages.

As we look at this program, as we look at it, if we see that there

are needs to take additional steps, we will work Commerce. We will

work with our partners. We will work with Congress to find the appropriate resources, and that includes the appropriate number of

people.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Well, Mr. Murdock, I am going to officially request that you consider that. You, obviously, are committed. We realize that. We think you need as much help as possible.

Let me try to quickly go to I assume someone has tackled this

last name while I was not here, and so what is your last name, sir?

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. Tarakajian.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Tarakajian. Thank you, Mr. Tarakajian.

Let me ask you, did you have a contract in 2000?

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. No, we did not.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Let me tell you that it was a major debacle

wrapped in insensitivity.

And so, my question to you is we have met some of the subcontractors, but what special emphasis are you going to utilize,

one, to prioritize underserved areas but particularly culturally distinctive areas?

Do you have in your mind, beyond your subcontractors, a format

for reaching the media outlets that are most relevant to certain

populations, whether it be Hispanic, African American or Asian,

and how important do you place that in your plan?

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. A lot of the media outlets, I believe, that you

talk about are local media outlets as opposed to national media

outlets.

While right now, the plan is just that, it is a plan as opposed to

something that is etched in granite, almost 50 percent, 45 percent

of the money of the budget that we have is allocated to local media

outlets as opposed to national media outlets. So the infrastructure

is there to go about creating that.

We are doing outreach to small businesses as part of our commitment on this plan, to make sure that we learn about and that we

give local media outlets, particularly the kinds that you, I think,

are referring to every opportunity to become part of this contract.

In addition, we are relying on our subcontractors who have expertise in this area to help us to find those local media outlets.

Then, fourth, the partnership effort is another source of information to come back to us in terms of what some of those outlets are

and how they could be utilized for the benefit of the census campaign.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. What is your overall budget?

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. The overall budget that we began with was

$207 million. We were recently informed that it is $212,100,000.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Is that for the whole media outreach?

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. That is for the entire campaign.

69

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Right, which includes the media and buying

time? Is that buying time too or is that separate?

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. No. That includes buying time as well.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Are you understanding that you just got an

increase?

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. Yes, to $212.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. What does that take the number up to?

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. Two hundred and twelve million, one hundred

thousand.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Do you intend to raise the amount that is

being spent in the African American community?

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. As a result of the increase, yes.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. I hope it is going to be increased beyond the

present number. To me, it looks like that number does not have

any relation to reality.

Mr. TARAKAJIAN. We have asked our African American partner

to plan at a higher level based on the 212,100,000. In addition, the

moneys that you are referring to that are currently being planned

are only the moneys that are in the media portion of the outreach

to Blacks. There is money in promotional materials which are partnership materials, fulfillment, things of that nature that are also

moneys that will impact the Black audience.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Well, let me thank the chairman for his courtesies.

I would suggest that you start looking upwards of $40 million

plus in terms of how you relate to communities that heretofore

have been unreached and had such high numbers of undercount

and work with minority papers, radio stations but also contractors

because I can assure you that they have the craft down well in how

to reach people in hard to reach places.

With that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much for that targeted questioning, Ms.

Jackson. I appreciate your participation in this hearing.

Mr. Gonzalez, you had one other question?

Mr. GONZALEZ. Yes, sir, and thank you for your indulgence, Mr.

Chairman.

Any additional costs or any glitch or in the census has a greater

impact on the hard to count population, and I hope that we can all

agree on that. It is a bad situation that we start off with, and anything that goes wrong has a disparate impact.

So I want to discuss fingerprinting and then some of the potential negative consequences which may be a noble goal to accomplish

here on the fingerprinting. If you are going to fingerprint all the

individuals that are out there basically hired and involved in the

data collection, one, it is going to be cost but, two, it is just going

to be the logistics of doing that.

The FBI is going to be charged with that. I can assure you from

my past experiences with other departments and agencies, there is

just no way it is going to be done without doing something for the

FBI to accommodate that kind of a task.

So I want to know where you are on the fingerprinting issue and

then any concerns that you have, one, as I said, as far as the delay

that could be. But even going beyond that, is there some other impact as we hire individuals that we feel will be more welcomed in

70

certain neighborhoods that have an aversion to anyone who is associated with the government?

Mr. MURDOCK. Let me explain where we are in fingerprinting

and why we are there. We have decided we have to do

fingerprinting, and here are the pros and cons.

The cons are clearly it is expensive. We are concerned as you are

that there will be people who will be concerned about involvement

with the census as a result of that process. It is a process as well

that is a difficult one for us but one that we will do.

Where the FBI will come in is that after we complete the fingerprints, they will do the assessment to see if there is any record of

problems with the individuals whose fingerprints we have sent to

them.

But here is the other side. The other side is that we have to be

very careful about the security and safety of American people.

It is the law of the land. We sought with the agencies that are

responsible for this. OPM said you have to do fingerprinting.

We went to the FBI, and the FBI last time gave us an exemption

because they could not process the forms. They tell us this time

they can process the forms. They told us ways that we could get

exemptions under certain circumstances, but they ended their letter by saying, we highly recommend that you do fingerprinting.

The difficulty we have and I have as the Census Bureau Director

is if I or my successor were to be in a situation where there was

an event. There is a very low probability. We have had very low

probabilities of any difficulties in the past, and so it is another factor that makes it difficult to make this decision.

But if there were an event at the beginning of the census and

you had to explain to the public, to the media, to others that, first

of all, you had not complied with the letter of the law, that you had

gone against the advice of the chief law enforcement agency of the

United States and other advice from other appropriate parties, I

think it would be disastrous for the Census Bureau Director and

others.

Now there are a variety of ways that could be addressed, but it

can’t be. I don’t see a way for us to address it as a Federal agency,

as a Federal entity unless we are given some kind of exemption of

some kind. We really don’t have a choice, I believe, as a responsible

party.

Mr. GONZALEZ. The other thing is, Director Murdock, the FBI is

going to be able to perform as they are promising on a timely basis

and it is not going to result in any delays. I mean this would be

disastrous.

The whole thing is that you are going to have to turn around

midstream on this thing when the FBI tells you they can’t meet

certain deadlines. You have to have your people out there. So then

you are going to tell the American people, well, we were going to

do this to safeguard you, but circumstances are such that we just

can’t. That troubles me.

So I think we do need to start off with what I think might be,

I hope, an accurate statement. Have we occasioned certain problems in the past because we did not fingerprint individuals?

Mr. MURDOCK. It is a very low incidence.

71

Mr. GONZALEZ. I have heard two or three or four. Now how

many?

Mr. MURDOCK. We had about four cases in the last census, very,

very low. Three of the cases, they were dismissed or acquitted. In

one case, there was a plea bargain down to a lesser offence. So, yes,

it is a very low probability.

Mr. GONZALEZ. These were individuals that had previous criminal records of some sort that we missed and then they went and

allegedly committed a criminal offense of some sort?

Mr. MURDOCK. These are persons who we found nothing on them

when we did what we did in the past which was name check. Name

check, if it came up problematic, then we did fingerprinting for

those individuals.

But yes, I mean we fully agree. In terms of those three factors

are ones that would suggest you not do fingerprinting.

On the other hand, the liability, the potential harm for the census if you were found to be operating, not obeying the law of the

land against the advice of the chief law enforcement agency of the

United States and against the advice of OPM, is one that is a very

serious administrative issue for a director.

Mr. GONZALEZ. I understand. I mean it is hard for me or for you

to argue that basic proposition. I am just saying as a practical matter, can you do it?

Second, again, you go into cost-benefit.

Three, is it really a false sense of security that you are giving

the American people? I think that it is, but that is just an argument for later.

I am just saying if that is what we are going to do, let’s make

sure that we fund it. No. 2, you have some deadlines now that have

been added as a result of this particular consideration. And so,

whatever help you need we are going to be here for it, but I have

a serious question about the necessity.

Mr. MURDOCK. Well, we absolutely understand. We have looked

at this very thoroughly. In a perfect world, we would have liked not

to have had this requirement if you could ensure the safety and security of the American people, if we could have been in compliance

with the law.

We certainly have issues and have concerns about some of the

elements that you have said. We have repeatedly asked the question, can these forms be processed, and we are assured that they

are, that they can. We have to go, I think, on a good faith effort

that when an agency tells us they can do that, they can do it.

Mr. GONZALEZ. Don’t be surprised.

I yield back.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much, Mr. Gonzalez.

I want to thank this panel, Mr. Tarakajian and Dr. Murdock, for

your testimony today. You are dismissed.

We will call up the second panel now, and I will swear them in.

We now hear from panel two and welcome to the three of you.

Thank you for being here.

Our first witness will be Dr. Roderick Harrison, director of the

DataBank at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies.

Welcome, Dr. Harrison.

72

The next witness will be Dr. Barbara A. McKinzie, Chair of the

2010 Census Subcommittee of the National Pan-Hellenic Council

and international president of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc.,

which I must note that Representative Watson is a member of that

organization as well as my wife, Ivie Clay.

Our final witness on the panel will be David Lange, general

manager of Scholastics Marketing Partners, Scholastic, Inc.

Welcome to all three of you all.

Ms. WATSON. Mr. Chairman, a point of personal privilege.

Mr. CLAY. Ms. Watson, please.

Ms. WATSON. May I, again, introduce one of our distinguished,

esteemed witnesses, the Honorable, and I am going to call her Honorable because she is our Grand Basileus, the national president of

the 300-member Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority which will be celebrating its 100th birthday here in Washington, DC, beginning tomorrow night and running through next week.

I am proud to say I am a member along with my erstwhile colleague on my left, and she can probably make remarks too, but

Representative Jackson-Lee and myself are so proud to have you

here.

I just want to announce to everybody that all next week you are

going to see the color she has on, green, and pink. It will look like

a flower garden of green and pink because we are expecting up to

25,000 members of the Pan-Hellenic Council, and we are so proud

to say that we were the first African American Greek organization

formed right here in Washington, DC, at Howard University. So

you will hear a lot from the pink and green Alpha Kappa Alpha

Sorority which was the first, and this Grand Basileus. So, welcome.

Our other witnesses are distinguished too, but I had to point out

that this is a point in history for us, our sorority, and welcome.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much, Ms. Watson.

Let me also point out that my mother-in-law and my wife, and

they tell me that my 14-year-old daughter will be AKA also.

[Laughter.]

Ms. Jackson-Lee.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. There is certainly no kinder chairman than

Mr. Clay at this moment.

Allow me as well to welcome Dr. McKinzie, our Grand Basileus,

our president of an organization that combines the character-building and challenge for leadership as well as the record of service.

As the planned program describes this coming week, for those of

you who will be here in Washington, it will be a happening that

you have never experienced before. Many look forward, Mr. Chairman, to the inaugural parade, but let me suggest to you that on

a certain day this week all of Washington will come to a standstill

because the ladies represented by Dr. McKinzie will take to Pennsylvania Avenue like you have never seen it before.

Whatever votes may be occurring on that time, count Sheila

Jackson-Lee and Diane Watson and Eddie Bernice Johnson missing, absent, because we will join the throngs of public servants and

leaders of high character with this great and wonderful sorority

that was founded, as my dear friend and colleague has said, here

in Washington, DC, with seven sisters. She is nodding her head,

seven sisters, and I think that is a symbolic number.

73

I thank the chairman for allowing me to welcome you but also

to express to those in the audience and for the record that we are

grateful for your service and leadership but, more importantly, for

you to take the time out to explain to us about the 2010 Census

Committee.

I know the role that our sorority will play in making sure the

undercounted will never be undercounted again and that 2010 will

be a new moment in America’s history on ensuring the counting

and the securing of good health and quality of life for all Americans.

I thank you, Mr. Chairman, for allowing me to acknowledge Dr.

Barbara McKinzie.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much, Ms. Jackson-Lee.

Just as a point of interest, in 2010, my hometown will host the

sorority, in St. Louis, MO in 2010.

It is the policy of this committee to swear in all witnesses. I

would like to ask all witnesses to please stand and raise your right

hands.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Mr. CLAY. Let the record reflect that the witnesses answered in

the affirmative.

We will begin with Dr. Harrison. You are recognized for 5 minutes.

STATEMENTS OF RODERICK HARRISON, DIRECTOR,

DATABANK, JOINT CENTER FOR POLITICAL AND ECONOMICS STUDIES; DR. BARBARA A. MCKINZIE, CHAIR, 2010 CENSUS SUBCOMMITTEE, NATIONAL PAN-HELLENIC COUNCIL;

AND DAVID J. LANGE, GENERAL MANAGER, SCHOLASTICS

MARKETING PARTNERS, SCHOLASTIC, INC.

STATEMENT OF RODERICK HARRISON

Mr. HARRISON. Thank you very much for the invitation to attend

this, and I will try to be very brief. I think much of what I had

in the written testimony has already been mentioned more effectively by some of the Representatives in their statements.

There also has been an undercount. We didn’t really begin to

measure it until the 1940’s when there were more people showing

up through the conscription system, the draft for World War II that

didn’t get counted in the 1940 census. There seemed to be, for example, about a 13 percent undercount of Blacks in the draft age,

male draft age population. So that is the beginning of some of the

modern efforts to measure the undercount.

From 1940 on through the 2000 census, the principle method for

estimating the undercount has been demographic analysis. That is

comparing census numbers with population estimates based on

births, deaths, immigration.

In 1990, the Bureau developed a second method, a dual estimation method based on a post-enumeration survey in which

170,000 households, housing units in about 5,400 census blocks

were sampled and matched the records of the people in these samples back to their census returns. If they did not have a census return to match it to, that meant that the count had missed them.

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So that is where we get the counts—it has been mentioned in

several things of the things—of the numbers of people that the census missed.

The census also does double-count, triple-count, usually doublecount other people who turn in two forms, report themselves, a relative reports them still in their household. This is particularly true

of college students and others. That is the overcount.

The net undercount, then the overcount is subtracted.

The point was made very effectively by Representative Clyburn.

I would just underscore that although that balances out

arithmetically and arithmetically it is important that it does balance out for purposes of apportionment, you cannot balance the

characteristics of people who are missed with the characteristics of

people who are double-counted. They are usually very different.

So, even if you are getting something that is, ‘‘good enough for

apportionment purposes,’’ you are getting data that is weaker than

we could possibly want for understanding characteristics, needs,

etc. with these populations.

The good news is that the 2000 census came very close to eliminating the undercount. The initial statistics that people have been

citing, missing about 1.6 percent of the population, 1.2 percent of

the population down from 1.6, this was the initial estimates on

which the decision to not adjust was based.

In fact, because demographic analysis suggested that the

undercount was much smaller and that perhaps there had been an

overcount, these analyses were redone through very complicated

things, and the Bureau’s final numbers suggest an overcount of the

population in the 2000 census, an overcount of 1.9 million. The revised undercount for Blacks was 1.8 percent down from 2.2 percent

undercount, net undercount. The undercount for Hispanics fell to

0.71, for American Indians on reservations, a net overcount of 0.88,

both of which are not significantly different from zero.

So, as far as a statistician can get you, you are getting as close

to an elimination of the undercount except for the Black population

in 2000 as you can possibly get.

Now the estimates that are used to measure are frankly you

don’t want to look into the sausage factory too closely. Again, I

think the key point is the number might look good, but it is balancing overcounts and undercounts which does not address some of

the concerns here.

So I think the question really is why was the 2000 census so successful relative to others? What do you need to do again that

might, may or may not be happening now to do it?

Some of the things that should be happening right now: the address lists, the use of the handhelds to collect addresses. Half of

the undercount is missed housing units. So working with local officials to correctly identify units and the other thing that partners

have to be concerned with is a lot of the missed units are converted

garages, a subdivided apartment, illegal, that have not been registered in the permit.

So part of the message, if there is a message, you can trust the

census. It is not going to get into your immigration status, your

status on programs. Just as important is convincing people who

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may be renting out a garage that in fact they need to get the form

to them.

So working with local officials on completing the address lists.

Getting as complete a list of housing units as possible.

Sending that massive army, 100,000 additional enumerators

were sent to hard to enumerate areas in census 2000. You are talking about you have your surge in Iraq. You, essentially, need your

surge in here.

Then the partnerships, the evidence is that the partnerships

were particularly successful for the Black population, less successful for language populations. I think that is in part some of the

complexities in not just getting out the count but explaining to people who they should report. There is going to need to be a lot of

training of the partners in that.

There were 140,000 partners in 2000.

Mr. CLAY. Dr. Harrison, let me stop you there. You have gone

over your 5 minutes, and we will get back to you in the question

period. But thank you.

Mr. HARRISON. Yes.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Harrison follows:]

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Mr. CLAY. Dr. McKinzie, you may proceed.

STATEMENT OF BARBARA A. MCKINZIE

Ms. MCKINZIE. Thank you, Chairman Clay, other distinguished

members of the panel.

It is a pleasure to be able to share thoughts with the members

of this elite group about the leaders and members of the National

Pan-Hellenic Council regarding the 2010 Census Partnership Program.

The National Pan-Hellenic Council was founded here in Washington, DC, in 1930. It consists of nine major fraternities and sororities, predominantly African American.

We have nearly 2,000,000 members and more than 6,000 chapters. Many African American leaders are among our members, and

we thank the acknowledgment of two of our personal members.

But our long-held spirited tradition of public service led us to

participate in 2000 census and calls our participation in the 2010

census.

In the past, our communities have been difficult to fully count

because of fear, apathy and other comments that have already been

made, and I won’t be repetitive. Even today, though, amidst a national housing crisis, some African Americans feel their needs will

never be met in America, and we have concern regarding the accuracy of that count due to the impact of this current crisis.

When these skeptics receive, though, positive feedback from

neighbors and leaders and friends that they know, they are far

more likely to fully participate. This was the contribution that we

were able to make in 2000 census, and it is our commitment to do

so in 2010.

We were deeply involved in 2000 in the Partnership Program.

We gave it a high priority. When it was over, we looked back to

identify what had worked best and what we learned from what we

had done.

Three things I would like to highlight: We learned that we provided the census with trusted access to African American communities throughout the Nation and throughout our leadership,

through our nearly 2 million college-trained educated members.

We also learned that our time-tested and proven infrastructure

of chapters and members proved to be invaluable not only in the

initial count but in the recount. Many of our members went all out

to use their networks to support this effort.

We also took time to identify aspects of the program that we

thought could be improved from what we learned in 2000: We

learned that we needed to start most things much earlier than we

had. There was a need for increased program funding. We needed

to diminish duplicative efforts particularly as it related to partners

who might have similar synergies and could strategically and

tactically do things together. We also knew that we needed to increase the Pan-Hellenic involvement of member organizations and

devise more ways to efficiently use the full range of proven information technology.

As we began work on the 2010 census, there are three principles

that the Bureau has adopted that should be fully implemented, we

believe, in this partnership program: One, the 2010 census inteVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:55 Mar 24, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00088 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\47524.TXT KATIE PsN: KATIE
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grated communications campaign urges all of us to cultivate a

large and diverse group of trusted voices within the African American community and act through specific outreach efforts.

Another is that this group has said, to assure full participation

in the census, the effort must be community focused, high spirited

and positively influenced by word of mouth communication.

Finally, the Partnership Program itself has noted that partner

organizations have the unique ability to serve as advocates.

We went further in identifying the best practices and issues that

we felt we could share with you in the form of recommendations,

principles that the Bureau has articulated to guide the full enumeration of the 2010 census. The following recommendations we

present: We need to better coordinate the efforts of all partnership

organizations across the spectrum if we are going to be truly effective.

We need a national 2010 census engagement project for both the

National Pan-Hellenic Council organizations and others to increase

our effectiveness in ensuring an accurate count, in particular, of African Americans. That project could support a more structured

Pan-Hellenic Council involvement, more concentrated efforts, better

resource management for organizations and the Bureau, more effective assistance with other 2010 initiatives such as the non-response followup, recruitment of census staff, access to minority

small businesses, work with elementary and secondary schools, involvement of minority-oriented advertising agencies, more intense

utilization of National Pan-Hellenic Council networks and, more

importantly, at the end of this process, better metrics to monitor

major aspects of the effort as it is underway.

Beyond these improvements, the Census Bureau must more

broadly and deeply involve community-based organizations and

leaders to be successful in 2010.

We heard earlier the efforts that are planned. What we didn’t

hear is the execution. We need to work together on these issues to

ensure a successful census in 2010 including a full count of African

Americans.

With that, we would like to thank you for the opportunity, Mr.

Chairman and other distinguished panels, to share our thoughts.

[The prepared statement of Ms. McKinzie follows:]

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Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much, Dr. McKinzie.

Mr. Lange, you are recognized for 5 minutes.

STATEMENT OF DAVID J. LANGE

Mr. LANGE. Chairman Clay and members of the subcommittee,

I am the general manager of Scholastic in School Solutions at Scholastic, Inc. and, perhaps more importantly, I was the project director for the prototype of Census in Schools for the 1998 census dress

rehearsal and for the subsequent rollout of Census in Schools for

2000.

On behalf of Scholastic, I thank the subcommittee for inviting me

to testify today, and we greatly appreciate the subcommittee’s ongoing interest in the Census in Schools program.

Founded in 1920, Scholastic is a global children’s publishing,

education and media company dedicated to helping children around

the world to read and learn. Scholastic is committed to helping

teachers by producing quality instructional materials that reach 97

percent of schools across the Nation. Additionally, our Web site

hosts over 2 million unique teacher visitors each month.

For the 1998 census dress rehearsal, Scholastic was engaged to

help develop and implement a prototype program in three test sites

that would both enlist our Nation’s schools in promoting participation in the census and provide quality educational materials to

teachers.

The Census in Schools Program was conceived to support census

2000’s proposed promotional outreach to communities with traditionally low response rates and hard to count populations and to

reduce children as a significant area of undercount. Initially, 30

percent of elementary school teachers and high school math and social studies teachers nationwide were conducted in order to reach

the target populations.

As the program evolved and obtained supplemental funding, its

objectives and scope expanded to include all 50 States, the District

of Columbia, Puerto Rico, island territories as well as tribal and

Bureau of Indian Affairs schools. In addition, what was initially envisioned as a program for K–12 schools was expanded to include

Head Start, pre-K programs and adult education programs for

English language learners.

As the scope of the program expanded, over 110 unique components were produced. Principals, parent-teacher organizations and

teachers in nearly every school received CIS materials that included information for families in six languages.

The nucleus of the program consisted of three sets of teaching

kits spanning grades K through 12. Each kit contained a giant

map, a teaching guide with lesson plans reflecting national curriculum standards. Teachers also received a class set of student takehome materials that conveyed to parents the importance of completing the census form.

Originally, the plan was to distribute 200,000 kits. Ultimately,

though, 1.6 million teaching kits were distributed by Scholastic.

Census in Schools was an important part of the overall effectiveness of the census 2000 campaign. Where trend projections indicated a 55 percent response rate for the census 2000 form, the actual response rate was 67 percent. This was the first ever increase

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in the response rate, yielding financial savings by reducing the

need to send human enumerators to non-responding households.

Submitted for the record are three survey reports that demonstrate the effectiveness of the Census in Schools Program. Highlights from these surveys report that in the 1998 South Carolina

dress rehearsal, 51 percent of parents learned about the census

from either talking with their school age child or information their

child brought home from school.

Overall, in post-program evaluations, 64 percent of all teachers

who heard about Census in Schools received Census in Schools materials, 65 percent would use those additional census teaching materials if they were made available, and 63 percent agreed that the

student take-home materials were an effective communications

tool.

Of equal importance is the value that the community partners

placed on these materials. Excluding the sample census form itself,

the Census in Schools materials were ranked as the most helpful

informational tool that the 140,000 community partners used to

reach targeted populations.

Let me repeat that if I may. Excluding the sample census form

itself, the Census in Schools materials were ranked as the most

helpful informational tool that the 140,000 community partners

used to reach targeted populations.

Looking ahead to 2010, you should first know that Scholastic has

been in discussions with DraftFCB and has offered both core and

expanded proposals for the Census in Schools. We are recommending that the program harness advancements in technology and

draw upon Scholastic’s and the Bureau’s experiences from Census

in Schools 2000 in order to implement an even more efficient, costeffective and far-reaching program.

Based on our experience, Scholastic believes any successful bidder for the 2010 Census in Schools Program would wish to consider

the following: First, a scalable and flexible plan that combines Census in Schools 2000 experience with current technologies in teaching environments; second, a combined use of print and digital mediums for promotions, educational tools and outreach to the home;

and, finally, a capacity to allow more teachers to easily identify and

use census materials that match their students’ needs and align

with national standards.

In closing, the 2000 Census in Schools Program succeeded in promoting the importance of participating in the census and in providing quality educational materials at no cost to schools.

Mr. Chairman, members of the subcommittee, I thank you for

this opportunity to testify, and I would be pleased to answer your

questions.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Lange follows:]

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Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much, Mr. Lange, for that informative

testimony.

Let me go to Mr. Gonzalez for questions, 5 minutes.

Mr. GONZALEZ. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Let me ask Dr. Harrison. You know there was a GAO report that

came out and one of the concerns. I am trying to figure out how

this, the lack of or the ability to maybe conduct a dress rehearsal

to the extent, to the degree that it has in the past would impact

the communications campaign. Do you have an opinion on that?

Mr. HARRISON. How the inability to conduct a rehearsal might affect?

Mr. GONZALEZ. Right. In the GAO study, it just basically says

that the Bureau also will institute new strategies through second

mailings and new approaches to remove late mail returns but has

only tested some aspects of these operations and will be unable to

test them in a dress rehearsal, making it difficult to estimate their

impact on operations in 2010.

Then in Mr. Lange’s written testimony, he makes reference to a

dress rehearsal in 2000.

I am just wondering. What I think what the Bureau is facing is

maybe an inability to conduct a dress rehearsal to the extent that

it did in the past. Does that impact this communications plan that

we have been discussing and is the subject of the hearing today?

Mr. HARRISON. I think that any time that you try to do something like this campaign, reach people, convince people to participate, the dialog that will accomplish that has to be reached by trial

and error. One of the strengths of partnership is people who have

been in communication with populations.

So I would suspect that you would learn something in a dress rehearsal that would help you develop a more effective national campaign once you get there. So, other things being equal, yes, I think

you can expect that people might learn early in the campaign,

things that they might have learned from a dress rehearsal if the

communications were part of it.

Mr. GONZALEZ. I will take this up with Dr. Murdock in what we

are going to do to maybe address some of the shortcomings as a

result of the inability of the dress rehearsal, again, to the degree

we have in the past.

Mr. Lange, the Census in the Schools, I remember this with Dr.

Prewitt 10 years ago, and I thought it was pretty effective.

She is actually pointing out something right now in the testimony that I may have missed, and I apologize. Is it scaled down,

the Census in the Schools?

I think there was reference that what has been eliminated would

be grades 7 through 12. Am I correct in that?

Mr. LANGE. Well, we have proposed two phases in our recommendations to DraftFCB: a core phase at $4 million and an additional expanded phase and, in the core phase, that 7 and 12 is

not included in that.

Mr. GONZALEZ. Now why?

Mr. LANGE. Financial limitations, budget limitations.

Mr. GONZALEZ. So we made the financial investment 10 years

ago, but we are not going to make the same financial investment

to cover grades K through 12 this go-round?

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Mr. LANGE. In the core program, that would be correct. In the

expanded proposal, it would definitely be included.

Mr. GONZALEZ. The difference between core and the expanded is?

Let’s just talk dollars. You have a substantial amount, obviously,

in the core because that is your main activity. In the expanded, I

would say it is probably less extensive effort.

Mr. LANGE. The core program is a very focused program and effective program that is designed to reach the top communities, if

you will, that require HTC outreach, and it would go to 35,000 K

through 6 schools in terms of print media or media in hand that

would help them. It is available to all K through 6 schools on the

Internet in a digital form. By expanding from $4 million to, say, upwards of $12 million,

you would be able to broaden the program quite significantly to include all K–12 schools with more materials in hand and more robust Census in Schools resources for all schools that it would reach.

Mr. GONZALEZ. In the hard to count populations—I am trying to

figure this out—it would go K through 6 or whatever it is. We will

capture a certain amount of the kids from these particular households, but it is not that those are over-represented in those grades

of these particular hard to count households.

I am trying to make sense of it somehow here. We say, well, we

have to identify certain grades in which these particular households may be over-represented by their children’s enrollment. It is

going to be K through 6.

That is not accurate, is it?

Mr. LANGE. It is not going to be exclusive to K through 6.

Mr. GONZALEZ. Right. I mean these populations, the hard to

count populations, their children are spread out through K through

12. They are not all concentrated at K through 6.

Mr. LANGE. That is correct. That is correct.

Mr. GONZALEZ. Thank you. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you, Mr. Gonzalez.

Ms. Watson, you are recognized.

Ms. WATSON. I will keep my time until after Ms. Jackson-Lee.

Mr. CLAY. Sure.

Ms. Jackson-Lee, proceed.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Again, my appreciation for the courtesies of

this committee, and this is a fascinating challenge.

Dr. Harrison, I would like to explore some policy questions with

you, and I will start first. I think my colleague and friend, Congressman Jefferson, was detained, but many of us know the travesty that occurred in 2005, Hurricane Katrina, that saw the largest

evacuation, I believe, that we have witnessed in the history of this

Nation short of the voluntary ‘‘go west, young man’’ and ‘‘young

woman’’ I assume in the 1800’s.

So, as we look toward the census and we know that one State

has been depleted of almost a million persons, many of whom consider themselves still placed in that State, what kind of policy

should we be looking at in order to be fair to a State like Louisiana

that has many of its constituents still viewing themselves as displaced and still viewing themselves as residents of Louisiana? That

is one question.

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A second question is what in your mind do you think the concept

was, and there must be some high order to it, of counting Johnnie

Mae’s grandson, and I don’t want to stereotype us, in so and so’s

prison as having resided in that prison when Johnnie Mae is still

counting or Mrs. Jones or Mr. Johnson is still counting that person

as a resident in their home?

Most often, that home is in an underserved, needy area, and so

that count is diminished because those numbers are counted in

some way, far away rural community. You question whether the resources that come back to the rural community anywhere equate

to the need inasmuch as there are individuals incarcerated and

being paid for.

My last policy question to you would be the issue of students who

likewise are counted in the area that they are in? Maybe there is

more of an explanation there, but again I wonder about the areas

of which many of them come from.

Mr. HARRISON. These are penetrating questions. There is a legal

answer, and there is a social policy answer, and I am afraid that

the two are opposite.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Help me out because I may want to redo the

legal answer.

Mr. HARRISON. You would need to ask a lawyer, but the Article

I of the Constitution.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. That you cited.

Mr. HARRISON. Pardon? Yes, that mandates the census, Article I,

Section II mandates that seats in the House of Representatives

should be determined and ‘‘apportioned among the several States

according to their respective numbers,’’ which essentially implies

residency in the State.

This, I think, has been interpreted to mean that if you are displaced as a victim, as displaced by Katrina or some of the recent

flooding in the Mississippi River, if you are a prisoner residing now

in prison in a different State and if you are a student going to

school in a different State, you would be a resident of the State in

which you are residing, even though I think most social planners

and for most of the social purposes for which we are disbursing

funds, Federal funds, etc., what we should be interested in is how

many prisoners will be returning to their State of origin, their locality of origin, how many students might be returning to there.

Their needs, students at a university, are very different than the

needs as a resident once they complete their studies, etc.

So I think that some of what, that this is mandated by a Constitution that is over 200 years old and that clearly did not anticipate some of these things.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. If I may, because I want to move to Dr.

McKinzie, but I like the way you framed it. Let me just ask for a

quick yes or no. Is it something you think is worthy of the Congress’ reconsideration, short of a constitutional amendment?

I mean there are ways of looking at the Constitution and modifying the interpretation by statute, by case law. Is it worth considering?

Mr. HARRISON. I think the Congress could give serious consideration in funding formulas to say that we want the count not to be

by the resident rules that govern apportionment, but we want the

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count to be by the place of origin, the home State of the student,

of the prisoner, etc. so that some funding, particularly programs

targeted to those populations. There might well be room that the

courts would agree with to have clauses that would specify the

State of origin rather than the current State of residency.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. If the gentleman would indulge me, I thank

you, Dr. Harrison. Mr. Lange, I am not discounting you, but if I

could just quickly ask Dr. McKinzie, and I will ask you for a quick

yes or no as well.

Dr. McKinzie, what I like most in your testimony was what we

need and what we didn’t do. You remember my question earlier to

Mr. Murdock about the partnership specialists, 680 for a country

that is large.

What you are suggesting is that the 2010 committee is ready to

go and, if you expand all of the various partners, then you need resources. I assume those specialists are helpful in getting you materials.

What is your assessment of the mind set of our census this time

around? Are they getting it about needing more resources, getting

it out to you quickly, having these special partners and do we, as

a Congress, need to make sure that we get the engine behind the

thinking of the Census Bureau?

It seems like they are repeating where they went, where we were

in 2000. We are right back where we were before.

And, Mr. Lange, if you would just followup quickly by just indicating whether you are getting the attention you need for your

school effort through the Census Bureau.

Dr. McKinzie.

Ms. MCKINZIE. The short answer is that they are committed, but

they have started very late. There is not enough funding, and they

are taking, in an analogy, a shotgun approach when it needs to be

very precise and deep.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Mr. Lange, if the chairman indulges me for

your final answer?

Mr. LANGE. The answer is yes, we have had very in-depth discussions with DraftFCB. I need to point out that we have not been selected. We are still in the competitive bidding process. So they have

been very receptive to our information, and they have provided us

with a lot of information as well.

So I think there is very good dialog there.

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. You are in the selection process, and I know

you hesitate to comment.

But, in any event, let me thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want

to indicate that I am unhappy as to where we are. This is a very

important hearing that you are having and however I can be of

help in terms of turning on the light about what is needed, I would

be happy to do so.

Maybe 2 years out, we might have some legislation on some of

the policy questions that I asked Dr. Harrison.

So I yield back, and I thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your leadership.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you, Ms. Jackson-Lee. I certainly want to explore the possibility of reclassifying both students and prisoners,

and we will have further discussions on that. Thank you.

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Ms. Watson.

Ms. WATSON. I want to thank all the panelists.

As the hour draws a little late here, I would like to address my

questioning to Dr. McKinzie because we are personally involved

and the Pan-Hellenic Council represents all the African American

Greek organizations. I have read your summary. What unique features can the Pan-Hellenic bring to the 2010?

I could read through. I have, and I know what they are, but I

would like the rest of our audience hear how we can be so effective

because we are unique.

Ms. MCKINZIE. Well, one, we are volunteers, but what is unique,

I mean our greatest asset is our infrastructure. Six thousand chapters around the world in rural and urban communities with members ready to execute a very precise plan is an asset that we bring

to this partnership because we also have a passion about an accurate count, and that really is a very unique asset that we do bring.

And so, the advertising is good, but what works for us is longterm planning so that we can make sure we are activating 90 percent or more of that 6,000-chapter network to count and recount

until we know everything has been counted. That is what we think

we have that is very unique, that the current plan doesn’t seem to

work not because it is not planned well, but there is just not

enough time.

For example, the department represents. We are having conferences this summer. As you noted, ours is here. There are the

other nine are having them also. While the Bureau will be at our

conferences, they will be there in the way of what we would call

advertising.

What I would have liked to have seen in ours, given 25,000 members here, is rolling out very specific tasks that could be done beginning this fall before next spring, that would ensure and identify

issues that would allow us to make a count work.

So while we are getting the awareness out there. But it is in our

community then, after that, it is the so what?

Ms. WATSON. I get the sense that we have not started early

enough, getting that awareness out.

I think about the homeless population in my own city. In an evening’s time, it could be anywhere between eighty and ninety thousand people homeless. They don’t know about the census. They

don’t have an address, and we did address that by letting them

register at a shelter, a homeless shelter.

But what does it mean to them, and so are we working on interpreting why an accurate count can really impact on them in a positive way? Are we doing any of that, Dr. McKinzie?

Ms. MCKINZIE. That would require awareness, education and a

plan.

An example with the Bureau, if it is determined in an urban

area that our approach is A which include homeless populations,

etc., but in rural areas it may be B. What we have as a unique

group is that once we roll out an urban plan and a rural plan and

once our volunteers have executed it, they could also do the same

thing other places around the globe.

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That is that infrastructure potential that I speak to, and we have

not been able to effectively move our Partnership Program from

what we did in 2000 to how do we get better at this in 2010.

Ms. WATSON. What is kind of disappointing to me is that the

budget has not increased for this effort where our population—and

I am being very personal in looking at my own State and my own

district—we grow by 2,000 per day.

Also, people are moving out to other places as well. Our State is

on fire right now. We are a desert for the most part, and we have

a huge shortfall of budget. But still, the people that are there need

to be counted.

I don’t think that the budget set aside for this outreach, integrated outreach into minority communities is recognizing the

change in demographics in the last 10 years. I think that is unfortunate.

And so, I think your organization composed of men and women

with college educations and a commitment to service can speak

loudly. In between now and the time we begin the process, I would

like maybe you to go to the press through your various organizations and let them know what is needed in our respective communities, and I think you can do that.

I know very often we use our sorority and fraternity houses as

a place for training and for providing materials. I think through

that network that you have, we can speak to that guy who is sleeping on the streets and doesn’t really understand why it is important to be counted and the lady who is in the apartment and she

comes to the door and says there are only two of us that live here

and really 12 are hotbedding it. You know something about that.

I always tell the enumerators. I said, go up over the liquor

stores. I said, see who is living over the cleaners and also come out

on Sundays and holidays where people get out of these small apartments and play with their children. You can get some sense about

the numbers.

So I think we play a very crucial role in determining how many

individuals are in the United States regardless of whether they are

legally here or not legally here. We set our budgets on populations.

I think that our organization, our combined Pan-Hellenic can do

a tremendous job in helping our census of 2010 and to continue to

be unique in what we can provide.

I want to thank Dr. Lange and Dr. Harrison for being here and

I want to thank my chairman. If you don’t mind, I have a responsibility, and I have to ease out to get there. So thank you so much.

Mr. CLAY. I do understand and thank you so much.

Dr. Harrison, as you know, the Bureau has experienced several

setbacks in its efforts to reengineer the 2010 census, the biggest

being problems with the technology, the field data collection system.

In your professional opinion, what are some of the operational

changes the Bureau must make in order to get on a consistent path

to reducing the undercount particularly of those demographic

groups that are undercounted each census?

Mr. HARRISON. One thing we can learn from the 2000 census, the

Bureau was—up until January 1999, the Supreme Court ruled that

it could not adjust for the undercount—was planning to do, to conVerDate 11-MAY-2000 12:55 Mar 24, 2009 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00112 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 C:\DOCS\47524.TXT KATIE PsN: KATIE
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duct a census in which it would adjust for the undercount. When

it was not permitted to do that, the Bureau had less time than it

currently has to completely redesign the 2000 census and achieve

the results, the improvements that we saw in 2000.

I think it will take. Dr. Prewitt, the Director for the 2000 census,

I think I just have to say did a remarkable job. I think you need

leadership. You need management and, as Dr. McKinzie said, I

think you need a great deal more intensive focus right now.

The campaign is, if we use a football analogy, is the air game.

The ground game is what the Bureau needs to pay attention to.

The ground game is getting the enumerators in place, identifying

the places where you are going to target more enumerators, the ‘‘be

counted’’ kinds of campaigns, all of these things which will be practiced in the dress rehearsal.

But that is where I would urge the committee and others concerned with this to pay very detailed attention to the Bureau’s

plans for the address list, non-response followup, ground game because that is where they have to be.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you so much for that response.

Dr. McKinzie, your recommendations for action are a great starting point to getting the Partnership Program up and running. It

is my hope that the Bureau will take them to heart. I am certainly

sure they heard them today and they heard the other concerns of

the people on this dais as well as this panel of witnesses.

Again, thank you so much for being here.

Mr. Lange, in your statement, you said over 90 percent of teachers connect with Scholastic on a regular basis, but you know that

a survey found only 56 percent of teachers had heard of the Census

in the Schools Program. Can you explain the discrepancies and

what are Scholastic’s plans to ensure that every teacher including

those that do not connect with you know about the Census in the

Schools program?

Mr. LANGE. Well, I would first say that the evolution in digital

technology has greatly improved our ability to connect with teachers and that we have over two million unique teacher visitors to

the site that we did not have in census 2000.

I would also say that the campaign that we initially conducted

in census 2000 was more of a direct marketing campaign and specific targeted outreach. It was not directed to be a mass campaign,

if you will, to reach all at the beginning. It did migrate to that toward the end of the program as the program matured and became

more robust, and more ambitious goals and objectives were put to

it.

I believe that in the upcoming 2010 in our recommendations

there, that we will be able to resolve that greatly, given what the

resources we now have to draw on.

Mr. CLAY. Wonderful. On behalf of myself and my colleagues, I

would like to thank all of our witnesses who participated in this

hearing today.

It is my hope that the Census Bureau will exercise due diligence

in its effort to count each and every person in this country and in

Puerto Rico and the island areas on April 1, 2010. Please let Congress know how to partner with the Bureau to ensure an accurate

count.

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With that, I will conclude the hearing and again say, thank you

all for your participation. Hearing adjourned. Thank you.

[Whereupon, at 5:56 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]

[The prepared statements of Hon. Joe Baca and Hon. Charles B.

Rangel and additional information submitted for the hearing record

follow:]

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