2014 Redistricting Data Program Phase 4 Plan

Redistricting Data Program Phase 4 in 2014

The U.S. Census Bureau requests specific approval for the continued implementation of Phase 4 of the Redistricting Data Program (RDP) Information Collection in Fiscal Year 2014, under the generic clearance for the Geographic Partnership Programs (GPPs), OMB Control No. 0607-0795. The continuation of the RDP Phase 4 Information Collection involves the collection of new congressional and state legislative district boundaries, or plans, from states that have made changes to these boundaries since 2012.

The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) approved the original request to implement the RDP Phase 4 Information Collection as part of OMB Control No. 0607-0795 on October 5, 2011 (ICR Reference Number 201103-0607-007). The purpose of this request is to renew the RDP Phase 4 as an approved Information Collection under the current extension of the generic clearance for the GPPs (OMB Control No. 0607-0795), which expires on July 31, 2015.

Once Congress is re-apportioned based on the 2010 Census population totals¹, the states begin the process of redistricting. During this process, the states create new boundaries for their congressional (CD) and state legislative districts (SLD). The Census Bureau Redistricting Data Office (RDO) will collect these newly redistricted plans during an extended Phase 4 of the RDP in FY2014. These will be the plans for the 114^th congressional and the 2015-2016 state legislative sessions.

The Census Bureau began collecting and processing these plans during 2011-2012, and will continue to collect them for states that conduct further redistricting, every two years thereafter. The Census Bureau retabulates the population of the new districts, when resources allow, based on the 2010 Census and the states are provided with that new data. The CD and SLD boundaries collected during Phase 4 are also used for disseminating American Community Survey (ACS) data.

At the request of the RDO, participants in each of the 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico will work with the Census Bureau to collect and process any newly redistricted plans. The state participants will collect the plans and provide them to the Census Bureau, along with additional information (population totals, legislation, etc.), as specified in the Phase 4 state participant instructions. The Census Bureau originally received OMB approval for the Phase 4 state participant instructions before delivering them to all participants in 2011, and they are currently available for download on the RDO web site. The new Phase 4 plans from participating states will be delivered to the Census Bureau starting in February 2014.

Phase 4 has an Annotation and a Verification phase. During the Annotation phase, the state participants use 2010 Census data provided to them by the RDO to create 2010 Census tabulation block equivalency files that will be used to update their CD and SLD boundaries. Once the states provide these block equivalency files, the Census Bureau will use those files to insert the new boundaries into various geographic databases. The Census Bureau will then provide Verification block equivalency files to the states during the Verification phase. The states will review these materials and certify to the RDO that the boundaries are correct.

We estimate that this work will take each RDP Phase 4 state participant that has changes an average of 50 hours to complete (40 hours for the Annotation phase and 10 hours for the Verification phase). We estimate eight (8) states/state equivalents will participate in the FY2014 round, which totals 400 hours of total burden.

The contact person for questions regarding the RDP Phase 4 Information Collection request is:

Gregory Hanks

Assistant Division Chief for Geographic Partnerships

U.S. Census Bureau

Geography Division

Washington, DC 20233

Phone: (301) 763-3093

E-mail: gregory.f.hanks.jr@census.gov

1 The law requires that by April 1 of the year following the decennial census the Secretary of Commerce will furnish State officials or their designees with the new population totals.