Office of Management and Budget |
1. To help control the cost of the 2010 Census and inform deliberations on the acceptability of those costs, the Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) should take steps to ensure that the Bureau of the Census improves the transparency of the fiscal exposure associated with the census. Specifically, OMB should ensure that the Bureau, in a notational item in the Program and Financing schedule of the President's budget, include an updated estimate of the life cycle costs of the census and the amount of money the Bureau expects to spend in each year of the cycle, as well as an explanation of any material changes from previous plans. The information should also contain an analysis of the sensitivity of the cost figures to specific assumptions, including a range of values for key cost assumptions, their impact on total cost estimates of the census, the likelihood associated with those ranges, and their impact on the total estimated cost of the census. |
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Office of Management and Budget |
2. As part of this process, OMB should establish triggers that would signal when the yearly 2010 Census costs, total 2010 Census costs, or both exceeded some predetermined amount. In such instances, the Bureau of the Census should then be required to prepare a special report to Congress and OMB justifying why the additional costs were necessary and what alternatives were considered. |
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Department of Commerce |
3. To enhance the performance and accountability of the Bureau of the Census, as well as to help convince Congress and other stakeholders that the Bureau has chosen an optimum design and will manage operations and control costs effectively, the Secretary of Commerce should direct the Bureau to improve the rigor of its planning process by developing an operational plan that consolidates budget, methodological, and other relevant information about the 2010 Census into a single, comprehensive project plan that would be updated as needed. Individual elements could include specific performance goals, how the Bureau's efforts, procedures, and projects would contribute to those goals, and what performance measures would be used. |
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Department of Commerce |
4. To enhance the performance and accountability of the Bureau of the Census, as well as to help convince Congress and other stakeholders that the Bureau has chosen an optimum design and will manage operations and control costs effectively, the Secretary of Commerce should direct the Bureau to improve the rigor of its planning process by developing an operational plan that consolidates budget, methodological, and other relevant information about the 2010 Census into a single, comprehensive project plan that would be updated as needed. Individual elements could include risk and mitigation plans that fully address all significant potential risks. |
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Department of Commerce |
5. To enhance the performance and accountability of the Bureau of the Census, as well as to help convince Congress and other stakeholders that the Bureau has chosen an optimum design and will manage operations and control costs effectively, the Secretary of Commerce should direct the Bureau to improve the rigor of its planning process by developing an operational plan that consolidates budget, methodological, and other relevant information about the 2010 Census into a single, comprehensive project plan that would be updated as needed. Individual elements could include detailed milestone estimates that identify all significant interrelationships. |
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Department of Commerce |
6. To enhance the performance and accountability of the Bureau of the Census, as well as to help convince Congress and other stakeholders that the Bureau has chosen an optimum design and will manage operations and control costs effectively, the Secretary of Commerce should direct the Bureau to improve the rigor of its planning process by developing an operational plan that consolidates budget, methodological, and other relevant information about the 2010 Census into a single, comprehensive project plan that would be updated as needed. Individual elements could include annually updated life cycle cost estimates, including a sensitivity analysis, and an explanation of significant changes in the assumptions on which these costs are based. |
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U.S. Census Bureau |
7. To help ensure that the nation has at its disposal the best possible data should there be problems with the quality of 2010 Census, the Bureau of the Census, with input from both majority and minority parties in the Senate and House of Representatives, should research the feasibility of procedures that could allow it to adjust census results for those purposes for which it is both legal and appropriate to do so and, if found to be feasible, test those procedures during the 2006 census test and 2008 census dress rehearsal. |
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