SSA ORR 0970-0033 Annual Survey of Refugees_Update March 2016

                                                    THE SUPPORTING STATEMENT

 

 

Specific Instructions

 

A. Justification

1. Circumstances Making the Collection of Information Necessary

The Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) is charged with seeing that refugees become effectively resettled in the U.S., with the primary goal of rapid self-sufficiency and adjustment. Since 1975, when Southeast Asian refugees first began arriving in the United States, ORR (and its predecessors) has commissioned periodic surveys of the refugee population.

A primary purpose of these surveys has been to enable ORR to fulfill its reporting requirement to Congress. The Refugee Act of 1980 (Section 413(a) of the Immigration and Nationality Act) requires the Secretary of Health and Human Services submit an Annual Report to Congress that "shall contain an updated profile of the employment and labor force statistics for refugees who have entered the United States within the five fiscal-year period immediately preceding the fiscal year within which the report is to be made…as well as a description of the extent to which refugees received the forms of assistance or services under this chapter during that period." ORR also makes aggregated findings of the survey available to the general public and uses the findings to make an overall evaluation of the program’s success in effectively resettling refugees, for purposes of program planning, policy-making, and future budgeting processes.

ORR plans to conduct the next survey for the purpose of obtaining information on the economic adjustment of refugees and other persons eligible for refugee programs when entering the United States.  Emphasis will be placed on income, employment and labor force data, English language ability, and the utilization of Government services. 

2. Purpose and Use of the Information Collection

A primary purpose of these surveys has been to enable ORR to fulfill its reporting requirement to Congress. The Refugee Act of 1980 (Section 413(a) of the Immigration and Nationality Act) requires the Secretary of Health and Human Services submit an Annual Report to Congress. ORR also makes aggregated findings of the survey available to the general public and uses the findings to make an overall evaluation of the program’s success in effectively resettling refugees, for purposes of program planning, policy-making, and future budgeting processes.

 

3. Use of Improved Information Technology and Burden Reduction

The use of Computer Aided Telephone Interviewing (CATI) will be employed to: 

• Reduce the use of paper and lower printing costs

• Centrally manage every aspect of the telephone interviewing process

• Standardize responses and increase accuracy

• Allow rapid collation of specific information

• Increase number of interviews that are conducted per day

• Allow rapid collation and statistical analysis of data

• Enhance quality control

   

The use of CATI reduces the burden estimate for the survey instrument by 2.4 minutes per response. The overall burden estimate for this information collection does not change, due to the addition of a Request for Participation letter (which includes an information collection from potential survey respondents) – see section 12 below.

4. Efforts to Identify Duplication and Use of Similar Information

No similar data are available from other sources. Though ORR receives data from many sources on refugee populations present in the U.S., there are no available data on refugees’ economic adjustment after arrival in the U.S over the five-year period after arrival. Per statute, ORR is specifically charged with collecting such data.  

5. Impact on Small Businesses or Other Small Entities

Not applicable.

 

6. Consequences of Collecting the Information Less Frequently

The survey must be conducted on a continuous basis because The Refugee Act of 1980 (Section 413(a) of the Immigration and Nationality Act) requires the Secretary of Health and Human Services to submit an Annual Report to Congress on the Refugee Resettlement Program. If ORR cannot complete the survey on an annual basis, we will be out of compliance with statute.

 

7. Special Circumstances Relating to the Guidelines of 5 CFR 1320.5

The Refugee Arrivals Data System, from which data are extracted for the purposes of developing a survey sample, is a Privacy Act System of Records.

8. Comments in Response to the Federal Register Notice and Efforts to Consult Outside the Agency

The 60-day Federal Register Notice was published on 10/14/2015, Volume 80, page 61819.

ORR received a comment from an individual requesting where to find the most recent data, raw and/or aggregated, collected with the survey. The link to the latest published Annual Report to Congress was provided.

ORR received multiple comments from an institution requesting that we capture additional data about refugee work experience, amending questions to obtain additional information, adding additional questions to capture refugee’s contributions to the nation’s economy and to capture data regarding refugee skills, credentials, to support refugees need to advance their careers. ORR is currently reviewing its entire questionnaire for the next survey period and will review the suggested comments into consideration if deemed in compliance.

9. Explanation of Any Payment or Gift to Respondents

 

To increase the response rate, we propose (with OMB permission) that respondents be offered a low-denomination (maximum $25) gift card or voucher to local establishments for food (similar to the WIC program) or education and training services. Because the card will be for a specific service, this incentive should not be considered additional income and would therefore not adversely affect benefits eligibility (e.g. Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (food stamps) or Medicaid) for survey respondents. We have included the cost of this incentive in estimate of the annualized cost to the Federal Government.

 

10. Assurance of Confidentiality Provided to Respondents

In the Introductory Statement of the survey, the following assurance of confidentiality is stated, “…any information that you give is will be held in confidence and will be used for statistical purposes only.”

To ensure confidentiality:

• Project staff are required to sign a non-disclosure agreement

• Each respondent is assigned a unique identifier to use in place of a name. Names are never included in the Annual Report to Congress, only the cumulative data.

• The electronic data are stored on a secure server.

 

11. Justification for Sensitive Questions

The information collected in the survey is a critical factor in understanding what resources are necessary to increase refugee populations’ ability to become acclimated to U.S. society.  It is also important to ask certain potentially sensitive questions as means of gathering the necessary information so that data-driven recommendations can be made to properly allocate funds to assist these populations. Every possible step is taken to fully inform respondents about the nature of the study (as well as any potentially sensitive questions), the voluntary aspect of their participation, benefits to them or to others from participation (in particular, that the information will be used to improve ORR’s ability to provide benefits and services in an effective way), and the extent to which confidentiality can be assured (no individual identifiers are retained in the data that is sent forward to ORR). This information is provided in the Request for Participation letter (included in clearance package).

12.   Estimates of Annualized Burden Hours and Costs

 

Annual Burden Estimates
Instrument	# of Respondents	# of responses per Respondent	Average burden hours per Response	Total burden hours
ORR-9 (Annual Survey of Refugees)	2000	1	0.5	1000
Request for Participation Letter	2000	1	0.05	100

Estimated Total Annual Burden Hours: 1,100

 

13. Estimates of Other Total Annual Cost Burden to Respondents and Record Keepers

There are no direct monetary costs to respondents other than their time to participate in the study. See section 14 for other costs.

 

14. Annualized Cost to the Federal Government

Estimated Annual Cost for FY 2015 Survey

Annual Survey of Refugees
LABOR	RATE	HOURS		ESTIMATED
Project Director/Sr. Statistician	$91.35	212		$19,366.20
Project Manager/Sr. Analyst	$52.00	404		$21,008.00
Analyst	$33.17	900		$29,538.00
CATI Programmer/IT Spec	$38.47	424		$15,412.40
Jr. IT Specialist Data Manager	$27.40 $25.00	280 584		$7,134.40 $13,589.68
Research Assistant (3)	$15.87	3928		$65,027.28
Research Interviewers (4)	$11.89	5040		$89,460.00
TOTAL LABOR		11772		$260,535.96
Fringe 29.04%				$75,659.64
Overhead 50.07%				$168,333.14
TOTAL LOADED LABOR				$504,528.74
OTHER DIRECT COSTS
	Rate	Quantity
Translation of survey instrument into commonly spoken languages	$2,000.00	1		$2,000.00
Copying/Printing				$8,450.00
Technical Support (Computer Aided Telephone Interviewing)	$13,750	1		$13,750.00
Contractor Travel				$2,000.00
Supplies				$15,225.38
Tracing Cost				$8,000.00
Provision of respondent incentives (proposed)	$25 per	1,750		$43.750.00
OTHER DIRECT COSTS				$97,705.38
G&A on ODCs only 21.45%				$128,829.50
TOTAL OTHER DIRECT COSTS				$76,894.21
TOTAL DIRECT COSTS (ODCS & LABOR)				$765,064.70
Fee 7%				$56,442.33
TOTAL CONTRACT COST				$862,770.38

 

 

15. Explanation for Program Changes or Adjustments

After internal review, we propose striking 41 of 133 survey items (30.8%). Twenty-seven of these items appear on the survey’s household roster, which means the focal respondent is asked these questions for all household members aged 16 and above. By adjusting the length of the roster, we will reduce response burden on large households, which the survey contractor suggests is a barrier to response for some sample members.

The primary purpose of the Annual Survey of Refugees is to fulfill ORR’s congressional reporting requirements; the survey items we propose to strike are not necessary for congressional reporting. It is also our hope that these reductions will lead to a more efficient use of resources while reducing burden on respondents and increasing the survey’s response rate. 

16. Plans for Tabulation and Publication and Project Time Schedule

ORR objectives are to locate the sampled respondents, conduct telephone interviews in the native language of the respondent, produce both cross-sectional and longitudinal data files with documentation, and provide several levels of analysis, including tabulations of the survey findings and patterns of non-response.

 

The contractor will tabulate the answers to the telephone interviews and the data will be analyzed. The findings will be presented as an electronic data file to include values for all variables as well as variable names and labels and submit a corresponding codebook. Upon completion of the field data collection activities, we will process all survey and administrative data, create both the cross-sectional and longitudinal data files, furnish associated documentation, conduct requested data analyses, and produce the analysis results in the tabular forms specified by ORR. 

 

Timeline

 

Major Task	Timeline
Tracing	Ongoing
Receipt of New Sample	End of May
Conduct Interviews	June or July through January
Complete Data File	January
Complete Requested Tabulations	January - March
Submit Longitudinal linked File	February - March
Publication (Annual Report to Congress)	As determined by Administration for Children and Families

 

17. Reason(s) Display of OMB Expiration Date is Inappropriate

Not applicable; expiration date will be displayed.

 

18. Exceptions to Certification for Paperwork Reduction Act Submissions

 None