83 FR 43638 - Submission for OMB Review; Comment Request

DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

Federal Register Volume 83, Issue 166 (August 27, 2018)

[Federal Register Volume 83, Number 166 (Monday, August 27, 2018)]
[Notices]
[Pages 43638-43640]
From the Federal Register Online  [www.thefederalregister.org]
[FR Doc No: 2018-18443]


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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE


Submission for OMB Review; Comment Request

    The Department of Commerce will submit to the Office of Management 
and Budget (OMB) for clearance the following proposal for collection of 
information under the provisions of the Paperwork Reduction Act.
    Agency: U.S. Census Bureau.
    Title: Boundary and Annexation Survey & Boundary Validation 
Program.
    OMB Control Number: 0607-0151.
    Form Number(s): BAS 1, BAS 2, BAS 3, BAS 5, BAS 6, BAS ARF, BASSC, 
BVP 1, BVP 2.
    Type of Request: Regular Submission.
    Number of Respondents: 132,465.
    Average Hours per Response: Varies.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                          Estimated time
               Stage of review or response                 per response
                                                              (hours)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Annual Response Notification............................             0.5
No Change Response......................................               4
Telephone Follow-up.....................................             0.5
Packages with Changes...................................               8
State Certification Review..............................              10
State Certification Local Review........................               2
Boundary Quality Assessment Reconciliation Project......              25

[[Page 43639]]

 
Boundary Validation Program.............................               2
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    Respondent Burden Hour: 265,590 \1\
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    \1\ The respondent burden hour was incorrectly estimated at 
270,710 hours in the previously published 60-Day presubmission 
notice. This mistake is corrected in the 30-Day FRN.
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    Needs and Uses: The Boundary and Annexation Survey (BAS) is one of 
the seven voluntary geographic partnership programs that collect 
boundaries, addresses, and streets to update the U.S. Census Bureau's 
Master Address File/Topologically Integrated Geographic Encoding and 
Referencing database (MAF/TIGER). The Census Bureau uses its geographic 
database to link demographic data from surveys and the decennial census 
to locations and areas, such as cities, school districts, and counties. 
In order to tabulate statistics by localities, the Census Bureau must 
have accurate addresses and boundaries. The boundaries collected during 
the BAS and other geographic programs become bounding features for 
census blocks, which are the building blocks for all Census Bureau 
geographic boundaries. While the Census Bureau's geographic programs 
differ in requirements, time frame, and participants, the BAS and other 
geographic programs all follow the same basic process:
    1. The Census Bureau invites eligible participants to the program. 
For the BAS, the Census Bureau invites legal governments.
    2. If they elect to participate in the program, participants 
receive a copy of the boundaries or addresses that the Census Bureau 
has on file. BAS participants can choose to review and update their 
boundaries using Geographic Update Partnership Software--which is a 
free customized mapping software--paper maps, or their own mapping 
software.
    3. Participants return their updates to the Census Bureau.
    4. The Census Bureau processes and verifies all submissions for 
accuracy, and updates its geographic database with boundary or address 
updates submitted by the participants.
    5. The Census Bureau uses the newly updated boundaries and 
addresses to tabulate statistics. The Census Bureau uses its geographic 
database to link demographic data from surveys and the decennial census 
to locations and areas, such as cities, congressional and legislative 
districts, and counties. To tabulate statistics by localities, the 
Census Bureau must have accurate addresses and boundaries.
    The BAS annually updates incorporated place boundaries, minor civil 
divisions, counties, and the federally recognized American Indian areas 
inventory for compliance with responsibilities specified in the OMB 
Circular A-16, Governmental Units and Administrative and Statistical 
Boundaries Data Theme. BAS supports the spatial data steward 
responsibilities of the OMB E-Gov, Data.gov, The National Map, and 
updates to the Geographic Names Information Systems. The results of the 
BAS are needed to provide information documenting the creation of newly 
incorporated places, minor civil divisions, counties, federally 
recognized American Indian Areas (including American Indian 
reservations, and off-reservation trust lands). BAS also includes the 
dissolution of incorporated places and minor civil divisions, and 
changes in the boundaries of incorporated places, minor civil 
divisions, counties, and American Indian Areas. Alaska Native Regional 
Corporations will be updated in the 2020 Census Participant Statistical 
Areas Program rather than BAS. BAS information provides an appropriate 
record for reporting the results of the decennial census, economic 
census, the Population Estimates Program, and surveys such as the 
American Community Survey. In the year 2020, all legal documentation 
for inclusion in the 2020 Census must be effective January 1, 2020. All 
legal boundary changes will be placed on hold and updated during the 
2021 BAS if effective January 2, 2020 or later.
    The BAS universe and mailing materials vary depending both upon the 
needs of the Census Bureau in fulfilling its censuses and household 
surveys and upon budget constraints. Counties or equivalent entities, 
federally recognized American Indian reservations, off-reservation 
trust lands, and tribal subdivisions are included in every BAS.
    There are projects to support the BAS among various levels of 
governments and obtain the most accurate boundary information. These 
are the:
     Boundary Quality Assessment and Reconciliation Project.
     Boundary Validation Program.
     State Certification Program.
    The Boundary Quality and Reconciliation Project (BQARP) supports 
the BAS program, improves boundary quality in the Census Bureau's MAF/
TIGER database and lessens the burden on BAS participants. BQARP works 
with state level cadastral or geographic information system 
coordinators to update state, county and incorporated place boundaries. 
The BAS would then continue the collection of annexations and de-
annexations on a transaction basis as they occur over time. Ensuring 
quality and spatially accurate boundaries is a critical component of 
the geographic preparations for the 2020 Census and the Census Bureau's 
ongoing geographic partnership programs and surveys. In addition, the 
improvement of boundary quality is an essential element of the Census 
Bureau's commitment as the responsible agency for legal boundaries 
under the OMB Circular A-16.
    The Census Bureau will conduct the 2020 Boundary Validation Program 
(BVP) in conjunction with the 2020 BAS. The BVP is a part of BAS 
conducted in preparation for the decennial census. The Census Bureau 
conducts the BVP every ten years to provide the highest elected or 
appointed officials of tribal and local governments an opportunity to 
review the boundary data collected during the BAS over the last decade. 
The 2020 BVP will cover:
     All actively functioning counties or statistically 
equivalent entities.
     Incorporated places (including consolidated cities).
     All actively functioning minor civil divisions.
     All federally recognized American Indian reservations and 
off-reservation trust land entities in the United States.
     Municipios, barrios, barrio-pueblos and subbarrios in 
Puerto Rico.
    In addition, the Census Bureau will send a letter to the governor 
of each state explaining the 2020 BVP process and advising them the 
Census Bureau will review the state boundaries in conjunction with 
relevant county boundaries as part of the BVP.
    The Census Bureau will conduct the 2020 BVP in two phases, initial 
and final. During the initial BVP phase, every highest elected official 
in the BAS universe will receive a BVP form, a letter with 
instructions, and paper maps or a CD/DVD containing a complete set of 
2020 BAS maps in PDF format for their governmental unit with the option 
to request other formats. The Census Bureau asks the highest elected 
official to review their boundaries and return the BVP form within ten 
days of receipt. If the highest elected official determines that there 
are no changes to report, the highest elected official will sign and 
return the validated BVP form. If the highest elected official 
determines that their entity requires boundary changes, the Census 
Bureau requests the highest elected official to work with their BAS 
contact to submit boundary changes through the 2020 BAS process. If 
either the highest elected official or the BAS

[[Page 43640]]

contact submits 2020 BAS boundary updates, effective as of January 1, 
2020, or before, by the deadline of March 1, 2020, the entity will be 
included in the final phase of the BVP. The government will have the 
option to submit the corrections on either paper or digital maps.
    In the final BVP phase, once the Census Bureau applies the 
participant's 2020 BAS boundary updates to the MAF/TIGER database, the 
Census Bureau will provide each highest elected official a complete set 
of updated 2020 BAS maps or shapefiles. The governments may request CD/
DVD, download or plotted paper maps. This is their final opportunity to 
review the boundary and verify that the Census Bureau clearly reflects 
the correct boundary in the MAF/TIGER database, effective January 1, 
2020, for the 2020 Census. In the final BVP phase, each highest elected 
official submits any remaining corrections within five days directly to 
the Census Bureau using the instructions provided in the BAS respondent 
guide.
    The final stage of BAS is the annual State Certification Program. 
This program allows state level agencies to verify that the status and 
boundary updates received through the previous years' BAS updates were 
accomplished according to state law. The State Certification Program 
will be held in 2018 and 2019. The BVP replaces the State Certification 
in 2020. During each cycle of this program, Governor-designated state 
certifying officials review listings of incorporated place legal 
boundary and functional status changes reported to the BAS during the 
previous year. The extent of the State Certification program varies 
depending on the laws governing annexations, deannexations, 
incorporations, and disincorporations in the given state. Some states 
have strong laws that require local governments to report legal 
boundary changes to the state government. In these states, the state 
certifying official is able to certify, edit, add, or reverse reported 
annexations, and may mark a legal boundary change as a duplicate of a 
previously reported change. In these states, the state certifying 
official also has the authority to request that the Census Bureau edit 
or delete information received from the local government. In states 
that do not require local governments to report legal boundary changes 
to the state, the Census Bureau will not edit or delete information 
without confirmation from the local government. If the state certifying 
official adds legal boundary changes missing from the Census Bureau's 
annexation list, the Census Bureau will contact the local government to 
request information. The State Certification program helps to ensure 
that all levels of government represent boundaries consistently and 
accurately.
    The data and information collected from the BAS and BVP serve 
tribal, federal, state and local governments, and the private sector. 
The BVP provides validation for the information collected through the 
BAS. The BAS is the primary provider for the following services and 
products:
    (1) Classify data collected in the periodic decennial and economic 
censuses and annual surveys.
    (2) Serve as the primary source of information regarding new 
incorporations, disincorporations, and other changes in the local and 
tribal government inventory for the Federal Information Processing 
Series and Geographic Names Information Systems programs, tribal, state 
and local officials, and private data users.
    (3) Update its estimates of the population as a result of the 
creation of new governments, the dissolution of governments, or changes 
in boundaries for existing local or tribal governments.
    (4) Serve as the source for governmental unit boundary information 
as a framework layer of the National Spatial Data Infrastructure for 
The National Map and the data.gov website.
    Information quality is an integral part of the pre-dissemination 
review of the information disseminated by the Census Bureau. 
Information quality is also integral to the information collections 
conducted by the Census Bureau, and we incorporate it into the 
clearance process as required by the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995.
    Affected Public: Tribal, state and local governments.
    Frequency: Annually.
    Respondent's Obligation: Voluntary.
    Legal Authority: Title 13, U.S.C., Section 6.
    This information collection request may be viewed at 
www.reginfo.gov. Follow the instructions to view Department of Commerce 
collections currently under review by OMB.
    Written comments and recommendations for the proposed information 
collection should be sent within 30 days of publication of this notice 
to [email protected] or fax to (202)395-5806.

Sheleen Dumas,
Departmental Lead PRA Officer, Office of the Chief Information Officer.
[FR Doc. 2018-18443 Filed 8-24-18; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 3510-07-P