ACS Data Users Group

Hello,

According to US Census Bureau, state data tables from the 2020 census will be available "by Sept 30th".

Just curious if anyone knows of any updates to this general release date.

Thanks!

Hi Derek,

Yes, I think this is the Redistricting Data for states in a new "easy-to-use" format as opposed to the legacy FTP format that was released on Aug. 12th. Last I heard, "BY Sept 30th" looks like it means Sept. 16th:

Regarding Diana's comment:

"My understanding (and others, please chime in if this is incorrect) is that this is just the redistricting data and nothing else, just like what was released on FTP in Aug. The full set of Demographic and Housing Characteristics will be later on, although haven't heard when."

That's my understanding as well. In addition, I believe there will be differences in some population counts because the full set of Demographic and Housing Characteristics can include imputations of missing values that are not allowed in the redistricting data (please chime in if this is incorrect).

I would love to have an estimated release date for the full set of 2020 results for planning purposes.

-- Dave

Yes, the Sept 16 data release of PL94-171 file will have just the same data as the August 12 release.

Dave-- I also would enjoy having the "release date for the full set of 2020 results." meaning: the DHC product, the product formerly known as SF1. But no one at Census Bureau is saying anything more specific than "some time in 2022." OK, some time in 2022.

I did ask Census Bureau recently about the data dictionary/schema for DHC product -- because the specific set of tables is NOT finalized yet, and neither are the Differential Privacy allocation & settings for DHC... I received back this reply:

"We are working on a revised data dictionary that includes the tables we're planning that are part of our Detailed DHC data product, which will include detailed race and household-person joins. We are hoping to release this crosswalk for public feedback later this month."

So now we wait.

--Todd Graham
Metropolitan Council Research
metrocouncil.org/data

I heard at the PL94 press conference that there was some plan to release, in some form, at some time, the text responses used for race and ethnicity -- would that be part of this neo-SF1 set?

They're saying September 16 now: www.census.gov/.../easier-to-use-formats-redistricting-data.html

If you need it sooner, it's SO much easier to use now that it's on NHGIS --you can get every county in every state, for instance, instead of having to download and process every geography in every state. You just have to translate column names (easy enough in R) https://data2.nhgis.org/main

They are saying the Summer of 2022 for the DHC1 and they are talking about a new DDHC, for the more detailed data. They are also indicating that the DHC1 will not be compatible with the PL94 nor with the DDHC. In short, there is a massive hold up on all of the Census data, because of DP despite the fact that it has become plain that DP at the level of epsilon they set gives precious little privacy protection.

See more here: https://www2.census.gov/about/partners/cac/sac/meetings/2021-09/presentation-status-update-2020-census-data-products-and-stakeholder-engagement-plans.pdf

Also there is no indication that they have solved the problem of producing tables that include housing/households and persons in the same table (number of Children under 18), etc.