IRE launches Web service with processed census data

Investigative Reporters and Editors, Inc. The IRE Journal, Jan/Feb 2004

A recently discontinued census data service by The Associated Press will be made available again through IRE.

Under a contract with AP, the IRE Database Library processed three sets of releases from the U.S. Census Bureau, starting in the spring of 2001. AP then made this information available to its member newsrooms through a Web site.

From the raw government files, the Database Library translated some of the coded material, added geographic information to every file for ease of use, and produced the data in a series of dBase IV files, easily read by any database manager software.

With the recent closing of the AP's Web census service - and as a service to journalists continuing to work with census data - IRE and NICAR will add services to provide easy access to the data.

The datasets soon to be offered:

* The data used for congressional redistricting (released in spring 2001), down to the block level with population counts for race and Hispanic or Latino categories. Public Law 94-171, enacted in 1975, directs the Census Bureau to provide redistricting data needed by the 50 states for their use in redrawing districts of the Congress and state legislatures.

The redistricting data provide population counts. It also has counts of Hispanic/Latino persons by race (63 categories) and not Hispanic/Latino persons by the race categories for both the total population and the population 18 years and over.

Other types of geographic entities covered include states, counties, county subdivisions, places, census tracts, block groups, congressional districts (106th Congress), American Indian and Alaska Native areas, and Hawaiian homelands.

Data also are provided for election precincts and state legislative districts where states have identified them for the Census Bureau.

* Summary File 1, from the Census short form and released in the summer of 2001, contains 286 detailed tables focused on age, sex, households, families, and housing units. These tables provide in-depth figures by race and Hispanic origin; some tables are repeated for each of nine race/Latino groups.

Counts also are provided for more than 40 American Indian and Alaska Native tribes and for groups within race categories. The race categories include 18 Asian groups and 12 Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander groups. Counts of persons of Hispanic origin by country of origin (28 groups) are also shown. Summary File 1 goes down to the block level for several data files, but only to the Census tract level for others. Other geographic areas include ZIP Code Tabulation Areas and congressional districts.

* Summary File 3, released in the summer of 2002, consists of 813 detailed tables of Census 2000 social, economic and housing characteristics compiled from a sample of approximately 19 million housing units (about 1 in 6 households) that received the Census 2000 long-form questionnaire.

Summary File 3 includes 484 population tables and 329 housing tables. Fifty-one tables are repeated for nine major race and Hispanic or Latino groups. Summary File 3 presents data down to the block group for many files, but only to the Census tract levels for others. Like the Summary File 1 data, it includes geographic areas such as ZIP Code Tabulation Areas and congressional districts.

The IRE Database Library will include documentation to describe each table and data element and will offer help in using, interpreting and mapping this data.

"This is part of our continuing effort to help and train journalists in the use of data for better in-depth and investigative stories and to archive and preserve government data," said Jeff Porter, Database Library director.

IRE will announce future developments on its list servs and its Web pages at www.2000census.org and www.ire.org. Send comments or questions via e-mail to census@ire.org.