Computer problems threaten 2010 Census!

March 9, 2008 - The handheld mobile computers that are supposed to replace the pens and paper long used by census-takers aren't working properly, and delays could send the cost from $600 million to as much as $2 billion.

The Census Bureau has done little, if any, planning for what to do if the hand-held mobile computers can't be made to work.

As a result, an important census dress rehearsal this spring has been delayed by a month as the agency looks for backup plans.

''I cannot overemphasize the seriousness of this problem,'' Census Bureau Director Steve Murdock told a Senate hearing last week.

That same day, the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, designated the 2010 Census a "high-risk area.''

The GAO's designation, which provides guidance for Congress about where the next bureaucratic crisis might lie, was the equivalent of a ''Beware of Landslides'' sign at the entrance to a treacherous mountain road.

The new hand-held devices would collect and manage data more efficiently and economically than legions of census-takers armed with pens and pads.

They were supposed to signal the Census Bureau's arrival into the digital age after more than two centuries of collecting data the old-fashioned way.

They would be used to verify addresses through global positioning software, collect data from households that did not mail back the census questionnaires, and manage a variety of information and tasks.

The government awarded a $600 million contract for the new system to a Florida company, Harris Corp. of Melbourne, in 2006.

But the Census Bureau continued to tinker with the specifications, which the GAO said led to delays and cost overruns. The agency didn't finalize the specifications until January.

Now the ''rough estimate'' for the revised contract could be as high as $2 billion, according to what census officials have told Congress, the GAO said.

Harris spokesman Marc Raimondi would not comment on who was to blame. But he said it was ``not unusual for programs of this size and length to encounter some customer requests for additional requirements that they feel best enables them to accomplish their mission.''

Census officials have known about potential pitfalls in their new computerized data collection system since 2006, when the GAO began to flash caution lights.

But they failed to heed warnings from the GAO and another evaluation.

Nor did the agency develop backup plans in case trouble did arise. Officials didn't think alternatives to the hand-held computers would be needed.

Technical problems developed during a field test last spring. The GAO said data transmission was ``slow and inconsistent.''

The worry is that the problems in the planning for the census could taint the results. That could ripple across the federal government in myriad ways.

Census data are used to apportion congressional seats, as well as to calculate how much money states receive for subsidized school lunches, highway aid and a host of other federal programs dependent on income and other demographic data.

Based on the census, state and local governments across the country received about $300 billion last year.