From the U.S. Government Accountability Office, www.gao.gov

Transcript for: High Risk: Census 2020

Description: As part of GAO's High Risk series, Robert Goldenkoff, a
director in GAO's Strategic Issues team, describes why GAO put the 2020
Decennial Census on its list of programs at high risk for waste, fraud,
abuse or mismanagement.

Related GAO Work: GAO-17-317: High-Risk Series: Progress On Many
High-Risk Areas, While Substantial Efforts Needed On Others

Released: February 2017


[ Background Music ]

[First Screen] GAO 2017 High Risk List Census 2020

>>[Photos of census workers] The demographic information the Census
Bureau collects is key to defining legislative districts and allocating
billions of dollars in financial assistance each year. In 2020, the
federal government will once again conduct a constitutionally-required
census of the nation’s population. But as the Census Bureau tries to
apply innovative technologies and new ideas to the count in order to
help control costs and maintain accuracy, it faces new challenges.

[Video of Robert Goldenkoff] Hi, I'm Robert Goldenkoff, a director in
GAO's Strategic Issues team. As you might expect, accurately counting a
nation of well over 300 million people in over 140 million housing units
is no easy task.

[Photos of Census materials and buildings] With a life-cycle cost of
over $12 billion, the 2010 Census was the most expensive U.S. census in
history.

The Bureau’s plan for 2020 includes innovations that it believes will
save taxpayers more than $5 billion compared to traditional methods.
These innovations include

[Photos of workers and individuals using computers]

---giving people the option of using the Internet to respond to Census
questionnaires,

---verifying addresses using digital maps and imagery in an office
instead of sending canvassers out to the streets,

---automating parts of the process, such as scheduling Census-takers and
assigning them work, and

---using more data from other agencies’ administrative records to reduce
the amount of fieldwork needed.

These innovations show promise for saving money, but they also introduce
new risks because the tools and techniques have not been used
extensively in earlier decennials, if at all.

[Video of Robert Goldenkoff] Given the importance of census data to the
nation and our concerns about the Census Bureau’s ability to conduct a
cost-effective headcount, GAO has added the Census to its 2017 High Risk
List.

[ Image: GAO logo ]