ACS Program Review - Stakeholder Feedback Plan & Justification

The U.S. Census Bureau plans to conduct additional survey work under the generic clearance for
Data User Evaluation Surveys (OMB number 0607-0760).
The Census Bureau’s Office of the Director is planning a survey to elicit feedback from a variety
of federal and non-federal American Community Survey (ACS) data users. The feedback from
this survey will educate the Census Bureau with regard to what changes ACS stakeholders want
from the ACS Program in the areas of data products, surveys methods, research and evaluation,
and ongoing communication.
The feedback form asks the stakeholders to make recommendations and focus on the underlying
issues. This information will become input into two elements of the ACS Program Review Methodological Review and Data Product Review. The results of this survey will be described in
a qualitative summary report, similar to how we report out on the results of responses to Federal
Register notices. The report will be distributed to internal Census Bureau stakeholders and will
be submitted to the formal ACS Program Review currently under contract with the National
Academies. Using the analysis of the complete ACS Program Review, the Census Bureau will
consider changes to the ACS Program. For example, the Census Bureau might decide to redesign
the data product set to better meet the program objectives. Asking for stakeholder feedback is a
necessary input to those types of decisions. The attached document “Stakeholder Engagement
Plan Summary for the American Community Survey Program Review” provides additional
information on the objectives, scope, methodology, and communications approaches we plan to
use.
In February of 2012, the Census Bureau will post a feedback form on the Internet, and
individually e-mail stakeholders an invitation to participate in the feedback process. Stakeholders
will be able to fill out an online form or type their answers in a Microsoft Word document and email it to a special e-mail box, “ACS.Program.Review@census.gov.” The Census Bureau plans
to send e-mails to about 100 people at governmental and non-governmental organizations with
interest in the ACS. They will be invited to go online to read about the program and give
feedback. The feedback survey itself will be available at an unadvertised location on the public
ACS Internet site. While some of the invited participants may forward the link to others
interested in the ACS, we expect most responses to come from the list of invited respondents.
The members of the ACS Communications and Stakeholder Management Review Team, the
Deputy Director, and the Director of the Census Bureau have reviewed the questionnaire. We
estimate respondent burden at one hour per questionnaire for a total respondent burden of 100
hours.
We plan to maximize response rates by sending e-mail messages and reminders. All respondents
will be invited to attend an informational webinar.
For further information about this study, please contact Sally Obenski at 301-763-4044 or
Sally.M.Obenski@census.gov.