WASHINGTON — A $600 million program to buy hand-held devices and create an automated network to collect data for the 2010 census faces major cost overruns and could cause delays in preparing for the nationwide head count.
Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez and Steve Murdock, director of the U.S. Census Bureau, briefed at least half a dozen congressional leaders and members of their staffs last week to discuss the agency’s contract to buy networking equipment and at least 500,000 hand-held devices.
The wireless devices would be used to collect information from people who do not mail in census forms, replacing the clipboards, pens and paper that census workers now use. The network would automate records in field offices, saving money that would be spent to print, store and transport forms and other documents.
But the program, called Field Data Collection Automation, has already gone $50 million over its original costs in the past two years, government auditors said. Congressional leaders said officials at the Census Bureau have warned that if they have to revert to pen and paper, it could add at least $1 billion to the $12 billion effort to conduct the 2010 census.
The Census Bureau needs to test the hand-held devices this spring to ensure that the equipment works and that the program does not fall behind schedule.
