Transcripts For CSPAN3 Census Modernization Efforts 20171023

Another but just aimed at sewing divisiveness on some really charged topics. Watch the communicators tonight at 8 00 eastern on cspan2. Next, commerce secretary wilbur ross testifies on modernization efforts at the u. S. Census bureau ahead of the next census in 2020. Secretary ross spoke about attempts to streamline Data Collection and to reach communities that were traditionally underrepresented. This hearing from the House Oversight committee is just under three hours. The committee will come to order. Without objection, chairs authorized to declare a recess at any time. Secretary ross is with us. Hell be joining us momentarily. Ill recognize myself for an Opening Statement and then my friend from maryland. The census is constitutionally required. It is what ensures that just as every vote should be counted, every person should be counted. This is a Condition Precedent for accurate redistricting and accurate reapportionment. The census is not only important for purposes of constituting our government, its also important for apportioning the resources and services of our government. So, the census is vitally important for a number of reasons. It is also eminently predictable. There are a few things that can be foreseen, quite like the dicennial census. It happens every ten years, whether youre ready or not. So, its incredibly important, beginning with the fundamental truth of counting every one of our fellow citizens, and we know well in advance when its coming. So, we cant complain that we were caught off guard, and we cant complain that we didnt see it. So, we have a couple more years before we actually count everyone, but now is the time to make sure that we are trod count everyone with accuracy, security and professionalism. Were all concerned with costs. Our fellow citizens are hearing about cuts in areas and there is concern about the deficit and debt. So cost is important, but its also important that we get this done right, accurately, professionally, with security and in a fashion worthy of the worlds great democracy. What would be even worse than unexpectedly high costs is unexpectedly high costs coupled with less than full success. So, we want to make sure the census is a success. We dont appropriate money on this committee, but we do help make sure the right questions are asked in a timely fashion. So, for secretary ross, i appreciate his time and i appreciate the time, frankly, that hes given our committee before today as well as his appearance today. We live in a country that is increasingly skeptical of whether or not we can get things done right, in a timely fashion and in an incredibly responsible way. I think our country as a whole, irrespective of the region in which you may live, or your political ideation, would appreciate a good news story, a story of how a Government Entity was prepared, efficient, and exceeded their expectations. So, 2020 may seem like a long ways off, but its coming, and when it comes, were going to have to have counted 300 millionplus people accurately, so i think time is of the essence even today. So, with that, i would welcome all of our witnesses, especially secretary ross, and i would yield the remainder of my time to the chairman of the subcommittee, mr. Meadows. Thank you, chairman. Thank you for your leadership on this particular issue. And as we go into this hearing today, i think its critically important that we all realize that while 2020 is a good ways off, we have already missed critical dates, critical testing, and critical implementation that should have already been done according to our own schedule that we have had in previous hearings. Of the i. T. Systems that are out there, there are some 43 i. T. Systems that need to be implemented. And yet, today, only four have actually been fully implemented. Another 31 are only partially done, and 18 have not been delivered in any form or fashion. And yet, we continue to have hearings over and over and over again about the critical nature of making sure that we not only get these systems implemented, but tested, and that we do endtoend testing on a basis to make sure that cybersecurity, other fumbles do not happen. And yet, here we are today on another hearing, and i am concerned that the focus will be on the 3 billion in terms of a budget shortfall and not on the other Critical Mission steps that have to be addressed. And so, lets today focus not on the 3 billion, but on the Management Issues that must be done. And in doing so, were talking a whole lot about Disaster Relief in every other area. Today is a day that we need to Start Talking about Disaster Relief for what will be a disaster if we dont get on this today. And so, mr. Secretary, thank you for coming. For our second panel of witnesses, thank you for coming. Ive been informed by some of your staff, mr. Secretary, that you are on this and that you plan to make sure that this is not just a budgetary component, that it is a component that actually looks at the management, procurement, and otherwise. And i was pleasantly assured of that, but we look forward to hearing more from you. I thank you, mr. Chairman, for your leadership. And as we get this right, i look forward for this to be a good story in the months and years to come. I yield back. The gentleman from North Carolina yields back. The gentleman from marylands recognized. Thank you very much, mr. Chairman. If theres one key point we can get across to those watching todays hearing, i believe it is simply this. The Census Bureau is dangerously underfunded and has been for years. And unless we do something about it right now, not yesterday, not today, but right this moment, this massive deficiency could imperil the fairness and accuracy of the census itself. Americans expect us to be able to do things right, and i think the chairman would agree with me. I think he just said it, we want to be effective and efficient in whatever we do. Mr. Meadows is right. Its not just a thing of money, its a thing of operation and making sure that things are done properly. So this is not a partisan observation. Both progressives and conservatives agree that current budget projections are way, way, way, way too low. Eli elyria, the president of the r street institute, wrote an op ed just this Tuesday Morning that the census is understaffed and underfunded, and that america is in serious danger of the census going wrong. Ladies and gentlemen, we cannot afford to allow that to happen. This is the United States of america, the exceptional nation. If we cannot count the 300plus Million People who are in our country, i dont know how exceptional we will be determined to be. Last month, the conservative American Enterprise institute joined with the center on budget and policy priorities in Warning Congress that current level of flat or nearflat funding is unprecedented and would significantly undercut efforts to conduct an accurate survey. They warned that shortchanging the census is penny wise and pound foolish, that it jeopardizes the bureaus ability to implement costeffective, new technologies, and it could backfire, costing taxpayers more in the long run. I say that we are better than that. Id like to show a few charts that illustrate this urgent problem. It wont show up on the screen, but members, it will show up on your screens at your desk. First, as we all know, funding for the Census Bureau certainly increases dramatically in years eight through ten of each decade to accommodate the rampup in activities for the census in year ten. The first chart shows funding for the last four decades in inflationadjusted dollars. For the 1990 census, the bureau increased from 596 million to 3 billion over the last four years. For the 2000 census, it increased from 535 million to 6. 9 billion over this period. For the 2010 census, it increased from 1. 1 billion to 8. 4 billion over this period. But what are we doing now . We are basically flatlining. The Trump Administration did not request a significant increase for 2018. You can see the same trends when you look at the budget from a percentage basis, which is what this next chart shows. The 1990 census had a massive increase in the last four years of the cycle, as did the 2000 census and the 2010 census. But here is where we are now. The administration is not on track to match past increases for 2020. If we use these historical trends to project forward, total Census Bureau funding would be increasing over the next several years, but that is not what is happening. As this last chart shows, there is a shortfall of about 760 million when you compare what the administration is requesting to past trends. I say that we are better than that. Now, Congress Shares part of the blame, no doubt about it. In 2012, congress insisted that the Census Bureau spend less on the 2020 census than it spent on the 2010 census. Congress refused to acknowledge or budget for two of the most significant and predictable drivers of Cost Increases that occurred between each dicennial census, inflation and population growth. Aggravating this problem even more, congress appropriated even less than the Census Bureau requested in every single year since 2012. Now, some people will argue that the Census Bureau was supposed to save billions of dollars this time around by using new i. T. Innovations to reduce the number of workers it needs to hire and increase the number of people who submit their forms online. The problem is that when you starve the Census Bureau year after year after year, it cannot make the investments needed to implement these innovations, and this is exactly what happened. And im sure director ross, secretary ross will talk about that. As a former director of the Census Bureau, john thompson, who left his position this summer, explained to the Washington Post just this week, and i quote, had we been funded to do everything we asked for then, wed be much farther ahead. He continued, at this point, theyre going to have to go back and do some of it your way, with paper and pencil. With paper and pencil. This is the exceptional nation, the one that has done the census over and over and over and over again. Secretary ross, i want to thank you for being here today and for Briefing Members of the Committee Last week. I understand you have limitat n limitations on your time, but mr. Secretary, we beg you to we have members, and im sure the chairman will emphasize this we have members that are very interested in this subject, and i hope that, i dont know what youre unless youre meeting with the president , i hope that you can spare us a few extra moments because we do want to get to have members ask. And as i close, and i know you will get into this during your testimony, but i appreciate that as a result of your own teams review, youve also recommended that the administration increase its request for 2018 by 187 million. And thank you for doing that, because so often we have secretaries come in, and they dont say exactly what they need because they dont want to get people upset. But this is just too important. I commend you for taking this step, and i know you understand the importance of this issue as a former enumerator yourself. However, i believe that even this request is far too low. Too low. Did you hear me, mr. Secretary . Too low. Especially given the number of tests that have been canceled and extremely low number of hires at the moment. And so, i know you are constrained in your current position. I was amazed to hear that the office of management and budget rejected your request for an additional 50 million for contingencies that are virtually certain to occur. Nevertheless, we have a responsibility under the constitution of the United States to ensure that the census is funded adequately and that the Census Bureau has the resources it needs to conduct a fair and accurate census. This should matter to each and every one of us, because while we historically discuss minority and immigrant operations being undercounted, low income and Rural Communities are also at risk of being missed, particularly in a digital census. For this reason, yesterday i joined my colleague, representative carolyn maloney, who also chairs a congressional census caucus, in introducing legislation to fund the bureau at 1. 935 billion this year, an amount that reflects budget projections from the bureaus fiscal year 2017 budget and an extra 135 million for increases in the necessary funds for the ccaf program. As i close, we must recognize the gravity of the situation we are facing. And mr. Chairman, i thank you while you have taken on this matter very, very seriously. Are facing. And mr. Chairman, i think. You have taken on this matter very, very seriously. As you said earlier, we had very informative meeting with the secretary. I think that helped to lay a foundation for this meeting. And i look forward to the testimony. And thank you very much for your indulgence. The gentleman from maryland yields back, we want to welcome you, mr. Secretary. Pursuant to committee rules, im going ask you to please stand and well administer the oath. If you raise your right hand, you solemnly swear or affirm the testimony youre to be give shall be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth so, help you god . Let the record reflect that the witness answered in the affirmative. You may take your seat, mr. Secretary. Your entire Opening Statement will be made part of the record. Youll have five minutes to summarize that. I want to say as mr. Cummings did, we appreciate the fact that there are other demands on your time, and we want to be good stewards on your time. The census is one of the unusual entities that is squarely within the jurisdiction of this committee. And there are lots of members that have questions. So what im going to ask of my colleagues on both sides is to exercise the selfrestraint of getting your questions done within five minutes. Im notoriously slow on the gavel because its hard to unlock the mysteries of the world in five minutes. But im going to ask my colleagues to selfdiscipline to get it done within five minutes so everyone can have a chance to interact with you, and we can also be a good stewart of your time. With that, i would invite you to turn on the microphone and you are recognized for your Opening Statement. Thank you very much. Chairman gowdy, Ranking Member cummings, and members of the committee, thank you for your continuing support and your discerning oversight. Thank you also for allowing the Opening Statements to be read while i was reviewing some of the newly developed materials so i could comment on it myself. An efficient 2020 census that provides a full, fair and accurate count has been one of my highest priorities since being confirmed in february. I myself was an enumerator as i work midway through business school. And so i have a strong appreciation for the responsibilities and the unique challenges of counting everyone in the United States once every ten years. Any operation that must hire and manage half a million temporary employees with complex and new technological systems and with rigid completion dates is bound to be a difficult undertaking for even the most experienced managers. And its been clear to me from the beginning of my tenure that census would be one of the most challenging aspects of the entire commerce portfolio. I agree with the members of this committee. The census is the bedrock upon which we construct our system of democratic representation. It provides for apportionment, redistricting, and the distribution of hundreds of billions of dollars of federal funding. Accordingly, some of my first meetings as the newly confirmed secretary of commerce were with the commerce staff. In those meetings i sought to identify and then address the key issues faced by the decennial census. My early concerns were heightened when only two months into my tenure, the Census Bureau suddenly announced a 40 cost overrun in one component, namely, the census enterprise Data Collection and processing cedcap program. A critical part of the infrastructure for the 2020 census. In terms of the broader decennial census, the Prior Administrations last life cycle cost estimate in the october 2015 was 12. 5 billion. When testifying before congress in june, i did not accept that figure. Instead, i vowed to return to congress after a thorough review with a vetted 2020 census life cycle cost that i could support. The product of that review is what brings me here today. As promised, we assembled a team of experts to conduct an independent review of the estimate. And they have come back with numbers i now stand behind as we continue our preparation for 2020. The team is comprised of Financial Management experts from the department of commerce, from the office of management and budget, former census employees, two former Technology Executives with the experience in rolling out complex systems, as well as other experts with extensive private sector experience. In conducting our review, we looked at the many concerns raised by the gao and members of congress, including those on this committee about the Census Bureaus cost estimates. Im aware of the funding statistics presented by Ranking Member cummings and can assure you that the 760 billion budget shortfall and its impact is encompassed within our new life cycle projections. You will hear testimony from both the gao and the commerce ig discussing their concerns with the prior 2015 life cycle cost estimate. For example, the gao estimated that the i. T. Budget would be at least 4. 8 billion. Our estimate is 4. 96 billion. So 160 million over the floor that the gao estimated would be the correct number rather than the previously used one. I share their concerns, and their testimony will underline the need and justification for this new life cycle cost estimate. Gao also points out that there are 43 Technology Systems involved in the 2018 end to end test. Only four of those systems had completed development and integration tests as of august 2017. And of the 39, a function of the a portion of the functionality has been deployed in the 2018 endtoend test. But that is not yet true for the remaining 18. With so much still under development, the need for a contingency to address possible overruns seems selfevident. These are just a few examples. The ig provided another example regarding address canvassing. Where they found that it would cost at least three times the amount the Census Bureau estimated in 2015. We agree with that, and we have incorporated that into our numbers. On the whole, we found that the Prior Administration provided congress and the public with overly optimistic assessments of both the ease of implementing new technologies and the cost savings they would provide. These issues were undoubtedly compounded by initial appropriation constraints. Also, procurement decisions created a series of silos, most of which had a small firm as the general contractor and a number of major firms as subcontractors. A very complex structure. Worse yet, many segments were on a time and materials basis. And in my view, thats the most dangerous form of a contract. The Prior Administration also failed to follow basic Management Practices like using certified cost estimators and checking estimates against actual costs. We have addressed these values and corrected the record with this new life cycle cost estimate. We identified key areas where Census Programing would likely create costs above the 2015 estimate. Those include declining selfResponse Rates, increased public concerns about privacy and cybersecurity. High levels of mistrust of the federal government, tightening in the labor markets since 2010, development and integration of new technologies and the complex array of contractors and subcontractors. This leads us to now project a revised life cycle cost estimate of 15. 6 billion. The increase includes contingency funding of 1. 2 billion to address additional potential risks and associated challenges such as national disasters, potentially even lower selfResponse Rates. The difficulty and cost of hiring 500,000 temporary workers in a tight labor market, and the complexity of developing and integrating multiple Information Technology innovations. Over 80 of the projected spending, over 80 will occur post 2018. So its a very backended expenditure as congressman cummings pointed out in his charts. In this rapid rampup in the future brings its own challenges to implementation and to cost control. Our 1. 2 billion reserve, a contingency of 10 of the post 2018 budget on top of the independent cost estimate level will be managed at the secretarial level and used only if unforeseen developments occur. A 10 contingency is commonplace in estimating complex private sector projects. Government tends not to set up reserves, but instead funds overruns in subsequent appropriation requests. Our new 15. 6 billion 2020 census life cycle cost estimate includes a request for a 187 million adjustment for fiscal year 2018. We are working with our house and Senate Appropriators on this request. These funds would allow us to make a significant course correction to keep crucial programs on track and provide much needed financial oversight and better management at the Census Bureau. The Census Bureau and the department of commerce will be held accountable to manage the 2020 census efficiently while maintaining the highest quality. The undersecretary for economic affairs, karen dunn kelly, has been in place since late august and has direct oversight over the 2020 census, the Census Bureau, and the bureau of economic analysis. She brings over three decades of Management Experience in the Financial Investment sector, with experience managing people, strategy, budgets, operations, public relations, and thought leadership across the globe. Seasoned and experienced Senior Management is also in place at the Census Bureau itself. Ron jarmin performing the nonexclusive duties and functions of the director of the u. S. Census bureau, and enrique lamas, performing the nonexclusive duties and functions of the Deputy Director and chief operating officer of the u. S. Census bureau are jointly leading the census, and each has nearly three decades of experience in census. Commerce now conducts weekly 2020 census oversight reviews and will require metric tracking and Program Execution status on a realtime basis. Commerce also has monthly meetings with omb, Census Program managers, and commerces 2020 Leadership Team headed by undersecretary kelly to review issues related to the programs budget, scope, schedule, and risks. These management meetings include detailed reviews of the evolving budget and life cycle cost estimate for the 2020 census. The results of these meetings are reported directly to me by undersecretary kelly and her staff, and we maintain a free flow of access and information so that i can personally oversee the progress of the decennial. We are now just 30 months away from the 2020 census. There is still many challenges ahead, and these Additional Resources i have described are urgently needed. But with the changes i have detailed and with the Additional Resources requested, i am confident we will have a full, fair, and accurate census. I look forward to working with this committee, your staff, and the rest of congress over the months and years to come, and i thank the committee for the opportunity to come before you today. I look forward to your requests. Thank you, mr. Secretary. The chair now recognizes the gentleman from tennessee, mr. Duncan. Well, thank you, mr. Chairman. Mr. Secretary, thank you for being with us. And i have two questions. Ill just ask them both so we get them in. Many of us who were here at the time of the last census received a lot of complaints about this American Community survey and that some privacy advocates were very critical, and our colleague ted poe has led a charge against this. He called that survey, quote, an unnecessary and completely unwarranted government intrusion, and he has led a charge to make that survey voluntary. And im wondering if you have looked into that to see if you can make that survey a little less intrusive so we wont get as many complaints this time as we did the last time. And secondly, the second question i have is many states are going to be trying to do everything they can to make sure that they dont lose a member of congress or maybe that they pick up one. And many federal appropriations are based on population. Can you assure us that steps are being taken, or are you satisfied that things are being done so that no states can inflate their populations in those kinds of with the goal of getting more money or another congressional seat . Well, thank you. Those are two questions. Ill try to answer them in sequence. The American Community survey is one of the department of commerces most valuable data products, and its widely used in the Business Community to make decisions. A voluntary survey would have a negative effect on the reliability of the data. Especially for rural and small communities. At the same time, the Census Bureau continues to look for ways to reduce the burden on respondents, such as removing questions by using other data sources, including information that people have already provided to government in a different form. So were trying to reduce the scope of the burden as a means of making it easier for people. In terms of trying to assure that we really do count everyone, weve made a number of changes. First of all, the Communications Budget for the 2010 decennial census was 350 million. And that included outreach to nonprimary English Speaking communities. We have increased that budget to 500 million this year or for 2020. And that equates to an inflation adjusted 420 million that would have been in 2010. So weve had a material step up in the Communications Budget. And in the 20102020 census, about half of that will go for our partnerships, the various faithbased and other Community Organizations that help us get to the more difficult to enumerate parts of the population. So we are keenly aware of the need for even greater effort than was used before. And finally, we have added internet response as an additional tool to make it more convenient for that portion of the population that likes to use internet. So weve made a number of very specific modifications, all of which we believe will lead to the end result of a more accurate and more complete census. All right. Thank you very much. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Gentleman yields back. The gentleman from maryland. Mike. In 2012, the congress directed the bureau to spend less than the 2000 census. And i quote, not adjusting for inflation, end of quote. Since that time, congress has basically starved the bureau of funds and has appropriated less than the Census Bureau requested in every single fiscal year since 2012. This must have negatively affected the bureaus investments in new technologies. Is that right . In other words, did it affect your investment in new technologies . Sir . Well, the expenditures youre describing, if i understand it correctly, are the ones prior to the present period. And i have seen the chart, and it roughly parallels even though the distribution year by year isnt the same, the 2020 one roughly parallels the expenditures for the 2010 census. The 2020 census is heavily back ended as were the prior ones. But its even more so because of the nature of the technological changes that were making. So if you would superimpose on your chart and in the supplemental material that i file after today, ill fill in the blank for you and show you how our projected budget for 2020 would compare both with the fluctuation, the amplitude in the prior ones, and youll see were coming to a significantly higher absolute level than they had been. Okay. In previous decades, this is the year, year eight when there are larger funding increases as the Census Bureau strictly ramps up towards census day. However, the Trump Administration did not seem to recognize this precedent earlier this year. The president requested only a 1. 8 increase in funding for the bureau in fiscal year 2018. Is that right . I believe so. And i believe that was based on the information he then had from the prior management of census. Well, you can you presented our committee with data last week showing that this level of funding is inadequate and could impair our ability to provide for a fair and accurate census. You are now requesting an additional 187 million to make up for what your department termed a, quote, shortfall, end of quote, in the budget request for fiscal year 2018. Is that figure correct . Yes, sir. I believe we do need 187 billion million more than was in. And omb supports that request. Is that right . Im sorry . And omb supports that request . Thats my understanding. You also informed the Committee Last week that you at the commerce department, as well as the Census Bureau, believe that you need more than that amount to fully be prepared for all eventualities. You asked for an additional 50 million to cover contingencies that almost certainly will occur. Is that correct . Yes, sir. But omb denied that request, is that right . For the contingencies . I dont know that they have taken a position on the overall life cycle costs. But our focus because of the urgency of the budget had been on getting their support for the immediate request for an additional appropriation. Do you know whether that came to the attention of mr. Mulvaney . Oh, its been brought to mr. Mulvaneys attention. Okay. By me. I see im running out of time. But do you know if the president is aware of your request for the additional 50 million . I have not personally spoken to the president about it. Last question. So what will happen if problems arise . How will you obtain funding to cover them . Well, we believe that the 187 billion will cover us through the fiscal year 2018. Were reasonably comfortable with that. The bigger risk comes after 2018 because thats when 80 plus percent of the money will be spent. All right. So 2018 we think is pretty high visibility, pretty well within hand. Its post that period that needs the big contingency. All right. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Gentleman yields back. Mr. Comer from kentucky. Thank you, mr. Chairman. The bureaus contracts im going to ask a question about the contracts, are set up as time and material contracts which means theyre limited incentives for contractors to control labor hours and costs. To your knowledge, what was the thinking behind this type of contract . I have no idea, sir. Ive been less worried about reexploring the past than about trying to make sure we get our arms around the future. What do you think the department can do to manage these contracts more effectively . Well, were interacting quite aggressively with the contractors, and thats about all that we really can do. Many of the contracts have very severe cancellation provisions, and would be very disruptive to cans at this stage in the game in any event. So i think we have to manage through the process pretty much with the existing group of contracting parties. But the intensity of interaction i can promise you is a lot more than it had been. Okay. One more quick question, mr. Secretary. With respect to i. T. , are you concerned that certain i. T. Products and systems may not be delivered in their final form and time for testing during the 2018 endtoend test . So far as we can tell, the ones that are incomplete are reasonably unscheduled. But its always the last 10 thats the devil. Its just like in any contract, the devils in the details. Okay. Well, thank you, mr. Secretary. Its an honor to have you here. Im a big fan of yours when you were on cnbc over the years. I yield back, mr. Chairman. Gentleman yields back. Ms. Maloney. Thank you. First of all, secretary ross is from the great state and city of new york. And id like to welcome you here today and thank you for your for your public service. Thank you. In your comments, you seem voir dire committed to getting an accurate count, which is mandated in our constitution. But if you look at the spending levels, granted youre just new in this job, but for the census of for 2020, the spending the red line is way behind the prior censuses from 2010, 2000, 1990. Can you raise the whole the chart a bit. I cant see the whole thing. You know what . Lets take it down and give him one of these. But this is a chart that we have on it, on the ratio of the census budget to year one of the decade. But in any event, as a businessman, its hard to achieve the results without spending. So i certainly support your spending requests of 187 million, and i think its a good start, but i dont think its good enough. You have a lot to catch up on. Several of the dress rehearsals were canceled. The Foreign Language rehearsals canceled. This is a major undertaking. Its one of the major undertakings of our country. And if we dont have a good census, you know we dont have good data for government policy or business policy. So i want to know what youre doing to address the immediate problem. And as i understand it, your increase of 187 million is basically for i. T. Work. But in your new life cycle estimate, you identified seven major cost drivers. The first two of these are all about Public Confidence, public response, and public concern. And these cost drivers can be addressed through education, and outreach and promotion of the census, and weve seen that before. The 1990 census was called failure because there was a declining Response Rate. In 2000, the 2000 census, the congress allocated more money and called for a paid advertising campaign. And for Partnership Outreach and all types of efforts to build up participation. And both in 2000 and 2010 were successful in increasing the public Response Rate, which is what its all about, getting people to participate. But by getting the public Response Rate up, it was critical in keeping the expensive followup methods that you have to do if theres an under count. So thats very important. Now i read recently in the Washington Post, that the ad contract congressman dated for 2020 hasnt been funded yet. And the partnerships have not been fully filled. The scenes us has to start early to be successful. The partnerships with communities like the naacp, like hispanics and Lgbt Community, you have to fill those contracts. And they havent been filled with people yet, as i understand. And nowhere in your testimony or your documents do you propose fully funding the ad contract as originally planned. Let alone increasing the contract to start addressing the later start in tracking these cost drivers that you identified in public outreach. So yesterday i am supporting your effort, mr. Secretary i introduce the 2020 American Census act, which would provide more funding for the census and mandate that funds be used on promotion, education, out reach, in addition to the i. T. That you are addressing. And i just would like to hear your comments on that. Id like to change the chairman for supporting the bill and the efforts to increase funding for it. And do you feel that funding the ad contract . Will you be funding the Partnership Outreach . Will you be funding education and outreach to get participation up in the census . Thank you, congresswoman. Im not used to being granted more money than i ask for, thats a totally new experience for me. We want to make sure we get an accurate account. As you look at this chart, were way behind spending in the prior censuses in this decade. As i said earlier to Ranking Member cummings, we believe cumulative shortfall of the 176 million and its impact on the Overall Program is made up for by the funding weve requested in the total life cycle cost. Will you be investing in promotion and education and advertising . Investing in all sorts of things. For one thing the communications brunlg will be budget will be 500 million as opposed to the 350 that was spent in 2010. Inflation adjusting the 2010 would bring it to 420. Were running 80 million more than on an inflation adjusted basis than the 2020. In addition my time is almost up. The Economic Survey is that on track . The economy survey. I think so. So far. But thats not the most urgent part of the problem of the communication. What were doing is several things. We have more ways that people can respond than ever before. Were doing more Language Training than before. For example, weve introduced telephone call centers. And they will have the capability of operating in ten languages. Naturally including spanish. Our population is more diverse than that. So the call centers will be able to do up to 10 languages. In addition, the census enumerators will be able to provide support through the people we select in multiple languages. Were trying to match the characteristics of the emum raters to the characteristics of the population in the area that they will be surveying. As to the partnerships, we certainly agree those are a big key. And those will include national organizations, state and local governments, churches, and other faithbased organizations, health clinics, Legal Aid Centers and other support mechanisms. So were trying to work with all of those, and the Partnership Program will consume approximately half of the 500 million budget for communication. Thats about 248 million will go for the partnership. So we believe that we are dealing adequately with the need for those. Thank you. Thank you very much. Gentlelady yields back. The gentleman from texas, mr. Farenthold. Thank you. Im over here in the corner. Secretary ross, other direction. Oh, sorry. Got a couple questions for you. It seems to me the Census Bureau has this attitude of we have to do it ourselves. And arent looking to products that maybe already out there or companies that you might be able to contract with to save some money. s for instance, its my understanding that the Census Bureau received numerous recommendations including from the gao and the Scientific Advisory committee as well as the private sector. How the Census Bureau could better use commercial mapping and gis, which would yield a large cost savings and increase productivity. However, to date, the Census Bureau doesnt appear to have recognized or implemented any or any of the recommendations. How come we havent been looking at things like that . Well, there were very many private organizations contacted in the original process. I cant vouch safe the process by which they made the final selections they did. That basically occurred years before. But were dealing with the contracts that we do have. We believe that these are qualified people. And we believe that we will be s able to get the job done, if we get the additional funding that we have requested. Can you maybe provide in terms of lessons learned. One of the things we intend to do as we go along is to keep careful track of further improvements that should be made in subsequent censuses. I think with only having 30 months between now and the 2020 did he decenial, making radical changes would probably guarantee that we didnt get it right. Im concerned about the path were on, not getting there. If you could get me a list of the proposals and recommendations, i sure would like to take a look at them. Just as an old computer guy we do the census every ten years and very few Computer Systems that have an effective life beyond ten years. Well gear up with the new Computer System in 2020. And here we are in 2030, well be sitting here doing the exact same thing. When it seems to me you could get with a Cloud Service that is secure. Weve got those that the government uses now. And get an application written for peoples phone. This seems a whole lot simpler. And this Cloud Service that we would use would buy the computers and size them the way they need to be sized. So they worked. And when were done with needing a massive capacity, there theyre for them to use for other clients. To me that makes economic sense. Rather than that trying this government attitude of weve got to do everything ourselves, especially in i. T. Where i think the government really struggles. Were dammed by some of our own contracting laws on that. It just seems like this is a great opportunity to look for some cost savings. And something i brought up to your predecessors several years ago, but apparently it fell on deaf ears. We do believe that the cost will come in below the inflation adjusted cost of the 2010 census. Notwithstanding that there are the overruns. My predecessors estimated that the inflation adjusted cost of 2020, using the 2010 methodology, would have been 17. 5 billion. So were way more than a billion below that. With all the problems that have occurred. Second, in terms of using existing data bases, we do what we can. For example, we are making a lot of use of the administrative records. The postal system records. Local with the irs records. Social security records. To check id. Things of that sort. But the truth is americans are very mobile population. Something like 12 relocate each year. Im running out of time. I do want to make one more comment. I do think the Postal Service is an unused government resource. It could be of more help to the census than i think theyre currently using. Youve got Postal Service employees that visit almost every american residence five, six times a week. Theres a great resource there that maybe underutilized. My time is expired. If youd like to comment further, im sure the chairman would we are. Were using the Postal Service and as i say the irs, social security, medicaid, medicare records. The Indian Health service. Every database that we can imagine, because were trying to make sure we count everyone, and that we count everyone one time. Gentleman from texas yields back. Gentleman is recognized. Thank you secretary ross. For your testimony. I dont know the geography of the committee well enough. I understand. Really, the census is about three things. Money, information, and power. And no community or state wins if we fail to get this right. Our nation will be the ultimate loser. And as you all know, our country i guess more mobile, as you said, and much more diverse than ever before. And sadly, in some parts of our nation, residents have a high level of distrust for the federal government, which makes them less inclined to take part in the census. Thats true in urban communities like the one that i represent in st. Louis which always struggles with a lower selfreporting response. In generally across the nation, african americans, asians and new immigrants, and the rural poor are at a much greater risk of not being counted. A costly mistake they will pay for for an entire decade. Thats why underfunding the census 2020 outreach programs to hard to count groups is such an enormous bipartisan threat to every state and every district that we represent. I guess im going to start the line of questioning following up on miss maloneys questioning. Hard to count, hard to reach audiences, and lack of funding for this initiative, mr. Secretary, which is part of your communications contract, must receive the full attention of your administration. I say that because communications effort. Because thats where the challenge will be. On how we get to those hard to count populations. If i could just hear your concerns about that. And where were going with it. Surely. The entity over all in charge of communications is young and which also was involved in the 2020 di sen yell. We have the Institutional Knowledge they gain by their role ten years ago. Second, the they have retained Something Like 15 individual firms that specialize either in different forms of media or different ethnic groups. We tried to pinpoint. Further i may not have made it clear when what i said before, but the 500 million of communications is in addition to the 248 million for the partnership. So altogether were spending 748 million on this out reach initiative. And when you consider how many total households there are, thats quite a bit per household. And if you take out of that the ones that are easy responders, were spending an enormous amount per household on the one that is are difficult to reach. Thats quite a deliberate thing. We have been con seshtive in our estimate of those who will give voluntary response. Last census was 63. 5 . Were assuming that may drop to 55 . So we have assumed a despite massive communications, we have assumed that a higher percentage of the population will still need the foot soldiers clogging around and ringing doorbells. And your Partnership Program calls for testing of communication. Methods. All communications elements. Yes, sir. And that is being cancelled for 2018. How will the elements be tested . It hasnt been cancelled. Its been postponed. Postponed. So in some time in the calendar year of 2018 it will be tested . Yes. I thank you for that response. I yield back. Gentleman j georgia is recognized. Appreciate you being here. Who is responsible to deliver the i. T. Products on time . Who is response . The Census Bureau is responsible. They have a whole series of contracting parties. If you count them all up theyre probably 100 individual entities. But somebody has to be responsible that the product is delivered. Well, ultimate le me at commerce. And karen kelly as the over sight of the census. So why are the it products not delivered on time . Whats the hold up . Of. For the delivery of the i. T. Products. Were going end to end and dont have what we need. I think the original estimates as to how long it would take and how much it would cost to get to those products were flawed. So some of it maybe contractor not performing as well. I cant judge what went on prior to the present. I think its a combination of over optimism on the part of census. And maybe some areas on the part of the contract. Is there any accountability, is there any penalty for not delivering on time what was promised to be delivered . Well, each contract is different. But when youre on a time and materials contract, the concept of penalty doesnt really work very well. So were just going to have ambitious we hope to deliver but we wont deliver, and theres no accountability. Theres not as much accountability as there would have been if there were fixed price, fixed time contracts. Thats not the situation that were faced with. So, when do we have when can we possibly guess under these circumstances that well receive what we have. We have given more than what we think is a guess. We have done lots of work out in the field. We have done analysis of whats been done thus far. Lots of analysis of the contracts. And we believe that this budget phased in the way that we have proposed will deliver the product that we need. I dont share your optimism. I dont see how in the world you can either with the type of situation were dealing with. And then you look at Cyber Security. How confident are you that this information gathered with an i. T. That hasnt been tested is going to be secure . Well, in todays world you cant be sure of anything in terms of Cyber Security. But i can assure you the systems were putting in are far more robust than anything that is ever been done before in census. I know last year that cio for bureau made a similar statement. Saying they had great confidence that the Cyber Security was in tact. And yet the system hadnt even been tested. How in the world can you have the confidence on something we know nothing about . First of all i didnt say i have confidence that its impengable. Its robust than had been true in 2010. How do you know that . Because of discussions with the people who are doing the implementation of it. But, having said that, im not aware that theres any system thats flawless. Sir, so you are giving great confidence to us about the Cyber Security based op conversations. No. Conversation is not enough to give assurance this is protected. The systems themselves will be far more robust than anything census has used before. Yet we have not seen the systems. No, because they are work in progress. Its all based on conversation. Not on test. This is all part of the problem. We get promises that are never delivered on. And we get now we have stiber security promises commitments that most robust thing we have seen before. That is simply based on conversation not on test. It looks to me like were going to go back to the same thing that happened in 2010 when we were promised all kinds of modernization. But it was a faulty program. So we end up with a paper based census. I dont see how we can proceed with this any further. Without going back to paper base and be honest with what were dealing with. Its impossible to test something that doesnt yet exist. My point precisely. 80 of the spending will be post 2018. But let me describe to you what it is that we are doing. All of the data on the census systems are being protected. Were playing some rigorous security protocol to the perimeter of the census own net work. Census has an existing net work. So were playing vigorous protocol to that. Were putting in routers and firewall. We have our own detection intrusion and prevention system in place at census. Census bureau now has an unprecedented level of engagement with the best resources elsewhere in the federal government. Were working closely with Cyber Security experts across the department. Including nist. Which is part of comers. The federal cio office. Department of homeland security, and the intelligence in Law Enforcement community. Were also putting a new level of Cyber Security federal management in place for the 2020 census over and above what was done in 120. Mr. Secretary, our time has gone. I know we want to respect the time. I appreciate your answers. They sound like talking points to me with not much beyond that. You cant test something that isnt in place. All right. The chair will recognize the gentle lady from the Virgin Islands. Thank you. Good morning, sir. How are you . I want to ask you some questions which of course are something thats on the minds of quite a number of americans right now. Is under taking census in areas that have recently been ravaged by disaster. And the mechanisms and processes that are potentially in place. To be able to do that. We know that millions of americans have been displaced by hurricane harvey, irma and maria. In the states of texas, florida and then the areas of puerto rico and Virgin Islands. As the communities work to rebuild, large scale changes are likely to occur that i assume would greatly impact the 2020 census. If we have learned anything from Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Its that recovery from large scale to Natural Disaster takes time and a quite a lot of time. 2011 report by the Leadership Conference on civil and human rights illustrated that challenges to enumeration Activity Still exist in the gulf region in 2010. Almost five years after katrina. The report highlighted issues such as large numbers of individuals and temporary housing. Informal housing arrangements, high ratesover vacant units. Significant changes in new Housing Stock and population fix in the affected areas. Mr. Secretary, do you agree the bureau is likely to encounter many if not all of the challenges due to the destruction caused by this years hurricanes and perhaps future hurricanes before the census takes place . You surely right in pointing out issues. Heres what were doing. During the 2010 census, they changed the operations in the areas that were hit by katrina and rita. What it involved was putting more people on the ground to deliver questionnaires directly to Housing Units and updating the addresses while doing so. We can do something similar in 2020. As needed. If it does turn out that we need that, it will cost more money. But we have tried to allow an amount for these types of contingencies provided that the and a half ral disasters are not more extreme than we have experienced in the past. In addition, we have a particular problem in the u. S. Virgin islands. And for that matter in puerto rico. We conduct the census in the territories by working directly with territorial governments to build and implement the operations that best fit their respective situations. Were developing our approach for the 2020 with the government of the Virgin Islands. And will ensure the operations taken to account the impact of the recent hurricanes. Excuse me. When you say particular challenges, what have you seen in the past as being uniqueness of trying to find census data in areas like puerto rico and the Virgin Islands besides the obvious is we dont have street addresses . Right. As you know the census has confronted those basic problems over and over. Every time that they have gone through it they have learned something from the process. The difficulty we have now is that the issue with residents has been terribly compounded by the awful destruction that occurred. So the magnitude of the task has become greater than it ever had been. Will your budget reflect the magnitude of the hurricanes . We have tried our best to do so. And i know in the past that you have done a good job of not just partnering with the local government, but with Community Organizations. As well. That they have been somewhat boots on the ground for you. Absolutely. Thats why we have allocated 248 million for partnerships with local Community Organizations. Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much. I yield back. Gentleman from alabama is recognized. Thank you, mr. Secretary for being here today. I understand the frustration that my colleagues have expressed. Give you an example the gao and the office of Inspector General have cited a number of issues where the Census Bureau that you inherited. Had to be totally troutful about it. But the frustration is that these dont appear to have been adequately addressed. For instance the included the 2020 census on the high risk list for 2017. In fact over the last three years aissued 30 recommendations. As of january this year only six have been implemented. Are you familiar with the list . Well, we have been working closely with the gao. You will be hearing from them a bit later. And we are cooperating with them in their audit of work we have been doing. My question, we only have five minutes. I want to give you an opportunity to answer this is a yes or no would be sufficient. Are you familiar with the list of 30 recommendations . I couldnt hear you. Are you familiar with the list from the gao the 30 recommendations . Sure. And youre aware only six have been implemented have been followed up on as of january of this year . As of january. That was true. I believe theres been further progress since then. There will be continuing progress. I think its extremely important that when the gao or the oig make recommendations when they have findings of issues that federal agencies federal departments act on them. Its frustrating to the folks who are doing the work. Its frustrating to us and the over sight capacity. Its not just the Census Bureau this occurred in other agencies. Theres a mounting frustration we identify problems and they dont get addressed. My question. Is this a top priority. Midlevel . How serious are you taking these . It certainly it a top priority. And i think youll find the oig testimony pretty well mirrors the top management challenges report that we put together. What happened prior to january of this year i cant account for. I was confirmed february 28. I realize that. I made that clear that you inherited most of the problems. The thipg we want to know is that under your leadership that this taken seriously. It is. The cost estimate. It began questioning that in 2008. It certainly is. My testimony today focussed on a lot of it. One of the recommendations is the bureau needs to manage the risk of implementing innovation. You heard my testimony. I totally agree with that. We have much more heavy handed in the management than there had been before. Second, the bureau continues to face challenges in implementing and securing key it systems. Is 100 true. For sure. The 2018 end to end test will probably reveal some more deficiencies that will have to deal with. My colleague from georgia expressed frustration with the testing progress. I appreciate your response. We have had the bureau had a number of problems in terms of failing to adequately test systems and products. And when they do test them theyre not using the results to inform the decision making. We will. Thats comforting to know. And im certain under your leadership that will happen. Thats one of the frustrations again that we have. Is that you had the goa and oig. This committee making recommendations. Its not just the department. This happened a number of times with other agencies. We want to make sure this is such a serious issue, we want to make sure that systems are tested and the results are used in the decision making. Mr. Chairman, i appreciate the opportunity to submit the question. I yield back. The it part was a key one. In the goa recommendation. As i mentioned earlier, our budget is more than what they felt was the minimum required. They came in thinking that as opposed to i think it was 36 the former administration had estimated. They recommended 48 or more. We came in at 4,000,000,960. Were not ignoring in of those recommendations not by a long shot. Gentleman from alabama yields back. The general lady from florida is recognized. Thank you so much. Thank you for being with us today. You have already talked about under counted populations. But this issue has been in the news recently because of the lawsuit filed by the naacp. Which it filed in part because of concerns about the under count of communities of color. Young children, home renters, low income persons and rule residents. Im concerned lt under count could be exaster baited in 2020. If minority groups are less inclined to share personal information with government due to climate of mistrust. By this immigration policy. Can you assure immigrant families and other bad word, but marginalized groups that the day will be kept confidential and not used to pursue Law Enforcement or immigration action . I believe it would be illegal for those data to be used for other purposes. So unless someone commits a crime i dont think that will happen. But on the naacp lawsuit, they filed a freedom of information act request with us. On the 29th of june. Secretary, excuse me. So youre saying if the information was used for Law Enforcement purposes, or for immigration policy, that that would be illegal . My understanding is that the information about specific individuals is not to be used for any other purpose. Using it would be illegal . Im trying to understand. Im not a lawyer. I cant parse that. As i understand it, its not to be used for any other purpose. Okay. One way i know you have also spoke about Partnership Programs. And certainly i believe that additional programs of that nature may lessen some of the concern. How Many Partnership specialists have you hired and how many do you anticipate hiring by census day . There are quite a few. Let me see if i can get the exact number. Okay. While youre looking, i think my colleague mr. Clay talked about testing of new processes okay. The answer is 40. 40 people. 40. How many do you anticipate in hiring by census day . Is that the total . 40 i believe is the total number. Okay. To date. Okay. Thank you very much. Any anticipated numbers by census day . At this point . Well see how much comes in. A lot of Community Organizations are well aware of the census, had participated in it before sdp are signing up themselves. So depending on whether we get a good flow consistent with improving it over the last time, that will determine how many people are needed. Okay. Thank you for that. I know you also spoke about testing of new procedures. Id like to talk about in rule, allen and triable areas. And tie in those procedures to the Budget Constraints that we currently face. Secretary ross, what are you doing to ensure that these new processes will work smoothly in rule allen and tribal areas . The tribal areas are one of the specific segments that are being tested. So that we can get real world results seeing how the procedures that we have introduced work. Okay. And for rural and island . Same. On the census web site. It says i quote we promise that we will use every technology, statistic kal, methology and physical security procedure at our disposal to protect your information unquote. Could you talk about how the adequate or inadequate funding might effect that promise . We believe the funding we have requested will provide us the resources we need. For that purpose. If you do not get the funding that you requested, are you able to fulfill the promise thats on your web site . We will do the best we can with the resources we get. We think that the optimal amount for the proper job is the amount we requested. Thank you, secretary ross. I yield back. The gentleman from iowa is recognized. Thank you, chairman. Secretary ross thank you for being here. 15. 6 billion i guess is the latest estimate. In iowa. Thats a lot of money. It is to me too, sir. 125 million households. The math if im correct is about 125 per household. Thats about right. To do what we want to do. Does that strike you as a large number . It is a large number. Its even a larger number when you consider that the vast bulk of that is spent on getting the last few million in. Because the ones who respond to the initial mailed document or respond over internet the cost of those is very small. Its the more difficult to e num raut people that are the most expensive to get to. The last few Million People are going to cost more than the first few million. The Response Rate is so critical. Youre a private sector guy. I am as well. Can you in 60 seconds let me know how much. Are we utilizing the private sector. Im tliing for example google. Probably didnt spend 15 billion to map the entire United States visually. Are we utilizing the Technology Available to the extent possible . I believe so. Can you expand on that. Briefly. Especially the technology piece. Well, the where the google Type Technology is helpful, is in locating physical structures. It doesnt really go within the structure to the individual person. So our task is first to identify the physical structures that have residents in them. Whatever the nature whatever the formality or informality of the living arrangement. Then the real test is to get inside them and find out exactly how many people are there. So thats where the selfresponses are very helpful. And were providing for internet selfresponse. Providing call centers to make it easy. And everybody is going to be getting mailings. And then finally as of last resort well use the primitive thing of a guy knocking on the door. Speaking of a guy knocking on the door. Back in my district in iowa i delivered the mail. One of them brought an idea to me. Why dont they use us more. For example i know exactly in my route how many people live in each house. I know their names. Why dont they utilize us . Great question. Oh we do. Our fundamental data base is the postal system. No question. But because people move, people die. People all kinds of things happen. Something like 12 of the population relocates during the course of a calendar year. Within the more difficult to enumerate portion, theres probably more mobility than there is say in Single Family home in a little town. So, its very complicated. We do begin with the postal system records. For sure. So you use the data base. Can we utilize the man knocking on the door . Can we utilize that. The postal carrier. The man knocking on the door is the last resort. Only when all the more efficient mechanisms have already been used. Looking at the 15. 6 billion. I thought if you and i formed a company, im guessing we could do it for 8 billion. Save the government seven. And we would put a few dollars in our pocket im guessing. Any truth to that . Well, i dont know. We are where we are. We do think urn the circumstances we really need the 15. 6. Thank you. Thanks for being here. I yoeld back. Gentleman from iowa yield back. Gentleman from pennsylvania is recognized. Thank you. I want to express my appreciation for the hearing. People dont think about the census that much. It is such an important thing. Its not just because its constitutionally mandated. That we need to get it right. We need to get it right so american federal government can work better for everybody. We need an accurate census. We need know where the people are. We need to know where the jobs are. We need know where the poverty is. We need to know how the economy is changing. We need to know what the government needs to do. And maybe needs to stop doing. And where these things need to happen. So much of policy depends on an accurate census. We need to get it right. Secretary ross its good to see you again. I saw you in may when you testified before the house appropriation committee. I want to touch on some areas that we do have concerns about. I think all of us in the room share the concern. We need to get it roigt. We want to learn from past mistakes. We dont want to have rose colored glasses. And unjustified hopes. We need to be a very practical and pragmatic about this. Youre that person, secretary ross. So i want to touch on a few things. First warning signs of trouble. May 3rd was when the census director thompson appeared buffer my subcommittee on appropriation. And we asked him hard questions. Much like the ones youre getting here today. And he resoined the next week. Thats a warning sign of trouble to me. He hasnt been replaced. First question, are there immediate plans to replace the census director . Yes. We had actually come up with a nominee and then that fell away during the vetting process. So were actively trying to recruit. But i have very good confidence in the team that we have asellabled right now. Namely the two people who collectively have some 30 years each of experience. Are there functioning every day. Karen kelly is providing over sight of them. Plus im being very personally involved and we have the whole series of ore sight meetings. Meetings with the contractors. Were all over this thing. As best we can be. Its not to say we dont want to have a permanent approved census director. We do and we will. Its not an easy task to fill. You need someone who has subject matter, command and Management Experience to deal with the enormously challenging task of hiring a half a million temporary workers. Getting them out there, getting them productive. And getting the Big Technology change introduced. You have a lot of other things that demand your attention. I urge you to devote the maximum effort into fipding that person. To be a strong active knowledgeable census director. Lets get that done quickly. Were trying our very best. We need to get this census right. One of the problems one of the red flags is we know there are under reported communities. A number of them have been mentioned by my colleagues. One of them i have noticed is the Lgbt Community. Historically under reported. Particularly older people. That young people are more likely to be homeless chl making it all the more likely they will be not counted. And in fact the Census Bureau itself has recognized that the Lgbt Community is hard to count population yet the bureau has declined to put questions about Sexual Orientation and gender identity in to the census. Secretary, did you determine that there was no federal need for this information . No, there were hearings held about it. There were requests put in and it was concluded that that particular set of questions did not meet the requirements for being put in. One of the problems with adding questions is it reduces Response Rate. Its may seem counter intuitive. The more things you ask in the forms the less likely you are to get them in. Theres a balancing act. Between more information and fewer responses. Secretary, my time is up. I want to associate myself with the hard questioning you got from my colleague congressman of georgia. I urge you to devote a great deal of attention to the online. The selfreporting. Increasing Public Confidence in the Cyber Security of this system. Because as you have said yourself today, thats the cheapest way we get the job done. With the selfreporting. With the online work. And i urge you to devote attention to increasing the Publics Trust in the online system. And giving them good reason to have trust in that system. With that i yield back. We share your concern. Thank you. Gentleman from california is recognized. Sorry about that. The gentleman from texas. I do want to say this, he was out several times ago and let others go. I apologize. Youre up and the gentleman from california. Thank you. And secretary ross. Its great to have you here. Its great to know that theres attention to this important issue. You have a very important portfolio. Its great youre involved in providing loerd ship for this. I know you have inherited i think the technical term is a mess. And i recognize i appreciate your comments about how to prevent the next census from being in a similar position. So i appreciate that. When some of your predecessors were here last time, there was a debate about whether the Census Bureau should develop a wijt. That uses the telecommunication backbone that the enumerator can put data in. And the question was that wij et exists. Its called a smart phone. And im glad to know that the Census Bureau decided to use i believe smart phones. And my question around that is have we discussed or have plans have you and the cio for the Census Bureau had some conversations around security of whatever device could be used by the enumerator . Yes. We have had consultation not only within the department. But with homeland security. With fbi, with the intelligence community. With the over all cio and the government. And in commerce. Were building in the best firewalls and routers that we possibly can. But having said that, theres some 13 yearold kid in a fwraj somewhere trying to figure out how to penetrate it. In todays world, you do your best. You cant be 100 sure. Unfortunately. You have to begin with the assumption of breech. I did this for a living. I never not got in. The fact that there is again focus from your office on this security of the systems and i know that 43 systems that have to be delivered or for end to end testing. In 2018. And only four of those have been delivered. I know theres conversation on that. And my concern is the bureau is going to have to get the authorizization to opener. The ato for each one of the systems. And i know some of the is section of the 43 systems already have ato. They need o get new ones because the systems is evolving. And im curious in the strategy that you and your i. T. Have discussed on ensuring we have the ato in time to protect those personally identifiable information. Especially on the 33 systems. That do have pi. Well, there are actually more than 50 systems that will be involved. And then their uses are to update and maintain the address list to enable people to respond by the internet. To identify the households that have not responded in order to send interviewers to them to manage the work of the interviewer. And to recruit and pay the fields work force. Those are just a few kparm examples of the kind of systems. Systems also capture, process, and tabulate all of the Data Collected on the People Living in the United States. Were monitoring the progress of all of the systems. And each one is at a different stage of completion. As we sit here. And so what is your strategy to ensure that the systems are delivered and have the ato necessary to get this done . Well, were trying to apply enough pressure on the contractors and surveillance of them to deal with the glitches that inevitably will come up. There will be unexpected problems in each area. And thats why we have allowed the 10 contingency. Because most of the problems that come up can be solved. Its a question of how many people it takes and what cost. Id like to offer that we would love to talk to the folks, those contractors. They may not be delivering on time and have them join you at the table to ensure the census done properly. My last question. Why did the head of the census the form drerkt tor leave the bureau . I think he is issued a Public Statement about why he left. I did not know him very well. So i cant really judge what his motivations were. He has found other employment in the statistic kal community. And he actually held a press conference at the National Press club a week or two after he resigned and explained what the motivations were. Thank you. I yield back the time i do not have. I apologize again for not counting the gentleman from texas. Embarrassing in a census hearing. I apologize for that. Gentleman from california. I dont mind you calling him the gentleman from california. We have had so many move to texas. I specify the other gentleman from california. Thank you so much for sticking around. Im over here. The newest member of the house and the committee. You sticking around is helpful to me. I never get to ask the questions. Im big fan of the census. Its a subject i studied in graduate school. Took classes on it. Its important to the entire country and how we operate. One of the issues is definitely the urn count when it comes to certain communities. African americans and hispanics. Im fearful that will go up in the next census because of the immigration policies. Of the new administration. The acting ice director issued a Statement Last week in response to a bill that was passed in california. Sb 54 the california value act. They would have no choice but to conduct large scale raids and enforcement with the neighborhoods and workplaces. What kind of you mention this also made me think about the Response Rate would be 55 . Has the i guess the new interior enforcement policy of the administration been taken into account when determining the Response Rate . The under count and just kind of figure out what impact it will have on the communities. Our starting point is a much more conservative one. As a result of that weve allocated more money to the defect to enumerate part. Second, we have increased the Communications Budget from the 350 million that was spent in 2010 to 500 million and even if you look at 2010 on a 2020 inflation adjusted basis, that would only bring it to 420. So its almost a 20 increase over the inflation adjusted basis. So were increasing the communication is one thing. Second, were spending 248 million on these Partnership Arrangements over and above what were spending on communications. Thats three quarters of a billion dollars essentially devoted to out reach. Most of that is, in fact, devoted to the last few million, the last few Percentage Points to try to minimize the danger ofundof undercounting. Were making use of ten different languages. Were doing all kinds of things that were not done before by way of training in order to improve the efficiency of the process. Im glad thats being taken into account. I guess thats why you have a lower number. Yes. Thats why also the partnerships are so important. I notice that you mentioned that only 40 Partnership Specialists have been currently budgeted. In 2000 there was 590 if thats correct. Whats your goal for the number of partnerships for the 2020 census. Our goal is our target is to get to a number on the order of magnitude of 800. Some Community Clinics have seen increases on the no show rate of 19 . Thats a big jump. If theyre not showing up to get physical and health checkups, youre going to see a lower Response Rate and lower counts in some of these communities. The gentleman from california is recognized. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Secretary, around here we always say that all questions have been asked but not by all of us here. Seeing as i appear as though im the last up to bat, ill try not to repeat any more than necessary. Mr. Duncan asked about the American Community survey. I just want to plant something. I have the same concerns he has of spruciveness and so on, but also have a concern of inaccuracy. Ive been living in the same house when im here for years. The last census and this census, they threatened my very livelihood if i dont answer questions about a place i dont live. So the absence of a targeting pursuant to the survey that would reasonably determine whether or not there is a resident. In other words, the place i reside in when im here, except for a corporate name on the title, theres no way to trace it back to anybody. It is a house that receives no mail, no bank accounts, absolutely nothing to it. Yet for whatever reason its the target of a Community Survey for which i ignore, to be honest. I take it into my staff and they then send it to the Census Bureau to say this is silly. The one thing i would ask is that you Going Forward ask the question of to get accuracy do you have to be random and without looking or in this modern age can you use tools to determine the high likelihood of places that should be surveyed . Just a thought. Heres the bigger thought. This is going to be my third census. As i came in as the first census and the question man from california departed, we inherented it frinherent inherited it from the clinton administration. That was before a great many advances both in statistical accuracy and in the ability to continuously monitor inventories. Today no sensible company ever has to shut down because they are continuously making sure their inventories are accurate. Over decades in how we look at accounting for things and ask the question on your watch shouldnt we begin the process, even if it requires congressional action, to go to a continuous counting system to make it constitutional, but to make it much more accurate, which today with tools both in counting and to be honest with the modern computer accuracy, couldnt we do the American People a Better Service . Well, i must confess with trying to get my arms around the existing process, ive not given much thought to changing the whole thing. There are probably pluses and minuses to the idea of the continual survey. At some point ill try to give some thought to it. But as you correctly point out, that would take a constitutional amendment. I would think thats going to be a big challenge in and of itself to make such a radical change in something so fundamental to the allocation of seats and allocation of monies. I would agree with you that if in fact the certification once every ten years, that the count was as accurate or more accurate than it would be by the Current System would require some action. The question is when you certify, when the Census Bureau certifies what our population and where it is in 2020, they will be doing so with the best efforts they can have, most of which will be done on a once every ten year count. What i would say to you, mr. Secretary is, if we look at what we should do for our progeny in the decades to come, if we begin now with some sort of effective study but then a commission that would in fact check out the feasibility, run the questions, create the question of could we have a higher confidence and could we have it every day of every month of every year rather than the estimates today which we rely on the estimates during the interim period. Why are they not as accurate or more accurate than the once every ten years . So i plant this for you because your real legacy can only be affected slightly in what you do from the time you take over to the time we have our census. You have a short period of time and most of the time has expired. But for 12 years now plus there is a question of whether or not we could improve the system, just as any of the portfolio of companies you are familiar would never close for a week once a year and think thats the best way to count inventory. I certainly agree with your analogy about the private sector. Thats 100 accurate. I do think that would be a very large undertaking to try to figure out the pluses and minuses of a continual thing. So i really do think that would take continued congressional appropriation. I dont want to divert any of the census people from the task at hand, because this is a heavy enough lift as it is. So to take some of them off that job and think about a possible alternative i really dont think is in the publics interests. That would have to be a separate appropriation. Weve got one more member to go. Im going to go last. One thing you and i heard today, the census is constitutionally significant. Counting people, apportionment, even the apportionment of goods and services, and what i learned from you last week is there is this causal link between cost and compliance. The compliance numbers are going down, the cost is going up. I dont remember a lot from my childhood because it was a long time ago. I do remember the seriousness with which my parents took the census. It was almost a form of public service. Maybe not to the level of jury service, but it was important. If you accept the belief that m most of our fellow citizens would like to help, particularly in an area thats constitutional significant and important and fundamental to our government, what are the impediments to the compliance rate . How do we reverse the trend of our fellow citizens not voluntarily complying . Well, i can only speculate, but ill give you a couple of thoughts on it. I think the fabric of the relationship between the public and the government has been deteriorating. I think theres less Public Confidence in government than there has been for a long time. I think thats one of the problems. I think a second problem is theres so much input that comes into everyone, whether its over social media, whether its through the conventional media, from whatever source. I think everybody is overdosed on information flow, junk mail, the whole thing. I think information clutter is a separate problem and its one of the problems even with the call center. A lot of people dont like to get incoming calls from strangers for whatever reason. To do not call list have proven quite ineffective. I find even though ive only be in government a short while, i get these robocalls on my official government cell phone. I think if we want to get Response Rates improved, we have to get rid of a lot of the intrusions that people find in the normal course. I was astonished to get i would say i probably get two or three junk calls a day on my official government cell phone. We might want to switch that number. Im happy to help you there if you want to get a different number. Maybe it wont help. I think your put your finger on something, the disconnect between the citizenry and the government and the lack of trust which leads to the next two areas. I dont think people mind answering questions where they see the relevance. How many folks live in your household, thats directly relevant to apportionment and redistricting and the provision of goods and services. I made a note you said in response to one of my colleagues that the more questions you ask, the lower the compliance rate is. Absolutely. You used the word counter intuitive. I think its not counter intuitive. The longer something takes me, the less likely i am to do it. The more intrusive i view it, the less likely i am to do it. Two things. I dont want to dwell on the Community Survey. It is not lost on me that american citizens can reject a jury trial, they can reject a lawyer, they can refuse to talk to the government, they can refuse to talk to Law Enforcement, they can refuse to vote. It is surprising to me that you can be punished for failing to tell the government how many bathrooms you have and what kind of fixtures you have. Given that you and i agree that the disconnect between the citizen ri and the government i would encourage you to be very judicial about what questions the government does ask. Two other points and were done. Cost matters. It matters, period, new paragraph. I think in lots of facets of life were willing to pay for quality. We do it with automobiles. We do it with sports events. I think if you were somehow able to convince our fellow citizens that theyre going to get an aplus product. Youre not happy about the extra cost, but if they can swallow that, theyll get an aplus product. I think its when you get the higher cost and the sub standard product that actually feeds that disconnect. I dont know you well. You were kind enough to come over last week. I know nothing about your background or politics. I will tell you this. You come across as an authentic person. You come across as someone that our fellow citizens would believe on an issue like this. I would encourage you to pair up with someone who has a different political ideology. Whatever yours is, find someone on the other side. Communicate, look, we get the disconnect. It would be really helpful if as americans if we got that compliance number up. Its going to save money. Its also more accurate. Im not talking about an ad campaign where youre on an ad at the super bowl. Just use the bully pulpit of being a cabinet level official to kind of reassure our citizens that you want to do it the right way and you want it to be accurate and you could use their help. I think thats very good advice and i will try very hard to use whatever bully pulpit comes with commerce to try to achieve that. On behalf of everyone, i want to thank you not just for today but also the briefing you gave us yesterday. We have another panel. I know that you have other things to do. So were going to recess and then allow the second panel to come forward. With that, thanks on behalf of all of us for