revised Supporting statement PPCS 2008 A.wpd

Supporting Statement

A. Justification

1. Necessity of the Information Collection

We request clearance to conduct the Police Public Contact Survey (PPCS) as a supplement to the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) to collect information about the nature and outcomes of respondent's face-to-face interactions with the police. This survey is required by Section 210402 of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 which mandates the collection, evaluation, and publication of data on the "use of excessive force by law enforcement officers." This Act was initiated due to the lack of reliable data on the extent of excessive force used by law enforcement officers.

The prevalence of face-to-face interactions with the police resulting in the use of excessive force by law enforcement officers in our country is a growing concern. The Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) was assigned the lead responsibility for developing a national reporting program to address the incidence, prevalence, characteristics, and official response to the use of excessive force. The NCVS was deemed to be the most practical means for obtaining information on this issue since it is an ongoing survey in which interviews are conducted with the American public concerning recent crime victimization experiences.

The NCVS provides national data on personal and household victimizations both reported and not reported to the police. The survey was initiated by the Law Enforcement Assistance Administration to fulfill the mandate set forth by Section 515b of Public Law 93-83 to collect, evaluate, publish, and disseminate information on the progress of law enforcement within the United States. The NCVS was transferred to the BJS in December 1979. Currently, Title 42, United States Code, Section 3732 of the Justice Systems Improvement Act of 1979, authorizes the BJS to collect statistics on victimization.

In May, June, and July 1996, the BJS supplemented the NCVS with a pilot test of an instrument (Police Public Contact Survey or PPCS) designed to collect answers from respondents to a series of questions about the nature and outcomes of their face-to-face interactions with the police. The pilot test of the PPCS resulted in a total of 6,421 persons age 12 and over interviewed during the trial period in 1996. Because those interviewed had a known probability of selection, the sample was weighted to represent the 216 million residents of the country aged 12 or older. Respondents in the PPCS were asked about their interactions with the police during the 12 months prior to the interview. Findings from the first PPCS were reported in the November 1997 BJS-NIJ publication Police Use of Force: Collection of National Data (NCJ-165040). The survey findings revealed that 20 percent of the public had a direct, face-to-face contact with a police officer at least once during the year preceding the survey. Furthermore, the findings from this survey provided empirical information to help guide future development of an improved questionnaire on the topic. The BJS redesigned the PPCS to accomplish a number of objectives not addressed by the original survey instrument, particularly with respect to broadening the range of participants describing their interactions with the police. The PPCS was once again conducted as a supplement to the NCVS between July 1, 1999 and December 31, 1999. An improved version of the survey instrument that included a new and more detailed set of questions about traffic stops by police was fielded among a national sample nearly 15 times as large as the pretest sample in 1996. Eligible survey respondents for the 1999 PPCS, however, were limited to those NCVS respondents who were 16 years of age or older. Estimates of the prevalence and nature of contacts between the public and police from the 1999 survey were nearly identical to those obtained from the 1996 pretest. The findings from the 1999 PPCS were reported in the February 2001 BJS publication Contact between Police and the Public (NCJ-184957) and revealed that about 21 percent of the public had a direct, face-to-face contact with a police officer at least once during the year preceding the survey. The PPCS was repeated as a supplement to the NCVS between July 1, 2002 and December 31, 2002, and then again from July through December 2005. Many of the questions for the 2002 and 2005 PPCS were reworded to streamline the format of the overall questionnaire and to reduce respondent burden. Plans are to conduct the PPCS again as a supplement to the NCVS between July 1, 2008 and December 31, 2008, for which approval is being requested.

2. Needs and Uses

The purpose of this survey is to obtain reliable data about respondent's interactions with the police and the possible use of excessive force by law enforcement officers during these contacts. The BJS uses this information for analytical and statistical purposes only. The BJS publishes reports to the Attorney General on the results of each PPCS conducted. No information will be provided in the reports that would reveal the identity of the victim or any law enforcement office. Findings from the first PPCS were reported in the November 1997 BJS-NIJ publication Police Use of Force: Collection of National Data (NCJ-165040). The survey findings provided empirical information to help guide future development of an improved questionnaire on the topic. Findings from the 1999 PPCS were reported in the February 2001 BJS-NIJ publication Contacts between Police and the Public: Findings from the 1999 National Survey (NCJ-184957). The PPCS was also conducted from July 1 to December 31, 2002 and again from July 1 to December 31, 2005. The PPCS provides an opportunity to learn more about police and citizen contacts. Given the high-level of attention and interest in police-citizen interactions, the PPCS has provided a means to collect such data from the public.

If the information were not collected at all, the Attorney General's mandate set forth by the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 could not be fully fulfilled.

3. Use of Information Technology

The 2008 PPCS will be conducted in a fully automated interviewing environment using computer-assisted personal interviewing technologies (CAPI). This is a result of the NCVS’ migration to a fully automated WINDOWS-based CATI and CAPI interviewing environment in July 2006. The NCVS discontinued its CATI operation in July 2007 due to budgetary reasons. Prior to July 2006, the NCVS and any periodic supplements were fielded using two modes of data collection, paper-and-pencil interviewing (PAPI) and DOS-based computer-assisted telephone interviewing (CATI). The current use of CAPI technologies reduce both respondent and interviewer burden. Furthermore, automated instruments afford the opportunity to implement inter-data item integrity constraints at the time of interview which minimize the amount of data inconsistency. More consistent data, in turn, reduces the need for extensive post-data collection editing and imputation processes which significantly reduce the time needed to release the data for public consumption. The use of technology results in more accurate data products that are delivered in a more timely fashion giving data users access to information while it is still relevant.

The NCVS sample consists of all household members age 12 or older residing in more than 51,000 households throughout the United States. Each eligible household member is interviewed twice during a calendar year resulting in about 150,000 interviews annually. The NCVS is conducted in 6-month intervals at selected households for a total of seven interviews. The first or initial interview is conducted in person while the remaining second through seventh interviews are conducted over the telephone. Telephone interviews are conducted in a secured area in the interviewer's home.

The PPCS will be conducted in all of the NCVS households. The U.S. Census Bureau will administer the supplemental interview to all persons in these households who are 16 years of age or older. Approximately 12,386 respondents a month will be eligible for the supplement. Based upon results of the PPCS conducted previously, we estimate that for the 2008 PPCS approximately 18.5 percent of the respondents will have had face-to-face contact with the police during the 12 months prior to the interview. The survey will be conducted for a 6-month period starting in July 2008 and extending through December 2008.

4. Efforts to Identify Duplication

Data collected by the BJS have been used to fulfill the mandate set forth by the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 to collect, evaluate, and publish data on the use of excessive force by law enforcement agencies. Past PPCS collections were instituted specifically to partially fulfill that mandate and consist of data obtained from a pilot test conducted in May, June, and July 1996 and from the national collections conducted in July through December of 1999, 2002, and 2005. The results from these surveys provided estimates of the prevalence of citizen contacts with police, including contacts in which police used force.

5. Minimizing Burden

Every effort is taken to ensure that the information collection is the least burdensome necessary to achieve program objectives. Furthermore, to minimize respondent burden and nonresponse on supplements to the NCVS, supplemental questionnaires are designed to take no longer than 10 to 15 minutes to administer. In fact, most supplements to the NCVS usually contain no more than 50-60 questions. For the PPCS, only those respondents who indicate that they had face-to-face contact will be asked additional questions about the incident. Based on results of previous administrations of the PPCS, we estimate that this is approximately 18.5 percent of interviewed respondents. Since conducting the 2005 PPCS, the BJS made some changes to the 2008 questionnaire. These changes include modifying the sequence in which the questions are asked, improving wording on certain questions, adding answer categories to make the collection of answer categories more comprehensive, and adding numerous questions about the time of contact, in what city/town/village contacted occurred relative to their current residence, and the number of minutes the traffic stop lasted.

6. Consequences of Less Frequent Collection

The supplement will be conducted between July through December 2008. Regular inclusion of this supplement into the NCVS is on a triennial basis. The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 mandates the collection, evaluation, and publication of data on the "use of excessive force by law enforcement officers." If the information were collected less frequently, the Attorney General's mandate to periodically publish reports to the Congress on police use of excessive force set forth by the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 could not be fully fulfilled.

7. Special Circumstances

There are no special circumstances that would cause the information collection to be conducted in a manner not consistent with Office of Management and Budget (OMB) guidelines.

8. Consultations Outside the Agency

The Census Bureau, the BJS, and a group of outside experts have cooperated over the years to develop and test the questions and procedures used to collect this supplemental information. For the 2008 PPCS, Matt Durose and Erica Smith from the BJS were the principal consultants. Those persons consulted from the Census Bureau included Marilyn Monahan, Jeremy Shimer, and Terry DeMaio. Steve Edwards, of the Bureau of Justice Assistance, and William Sabol, of BJS, reviewed and provided useful comments on the 2008 survey.

9. Paying Respondents

Incentive payments or gifts to respondents to encourage participation are not provided.

10. Assurance of Confidentiality

All information that can identify individuals will be held strictly confidential by the Census Bureau and the BJS according to the provisions stated in Title 13, United States Code, Section 9, and Title 42, United States Code, Sections 3789g and 3735. Only Census Bureau employees sworn to preserve this confidentiality, with a need to know, may access and review PPCS data. The respondents are assured confidentiality and informed that their participation is voluntary in a letter from the Director of the Census Bureau (See attached).

11. Justification for Sensitive Questions

No questions relating to sexual behaviors, religious beliefs, or other matters commonly considered private or of a sensitive nature are asked in these supplemental questions.

12. Estimated of Hour Burden

A total of approximately 74,317 persons will be eligible for the PPCS questions during July through December 2008. Of the 74,317 persons, we expect approximately 80 percent or 59,231 persons will complete a PPCS interview. (This percentage is based on the response rate from the previous PPCS.) Of those persons interviewed for the PPCS, we estimate approximately 81.5 percent or 48,272 persons will complete only the first two (contact screener questions) survey questions. The estimated time to read the introductory statement and administer the first two contact screener questions to the respondents is approximately .025 hours (1.5 minutes) per person. Furthermore, we estimate that the remaining 18.5 percent of the interviewed persons or 10,958 persons will report contact with the police. The time required to ask the detailed questions regarding the nature of the contact is estimated to take an average of .167 hours (10 minutes). Therefore, total estimated respondent burden is approximately 3,037 hours. Respondents will be asked to respond to this survey only once during the six month period.

13. Estimate of Cost Burden

There are no costs to respondents other than that of their time to respond.

14. Costs to Federal Government

We estimate the cost to the Federal Government to test, conduct, and process this survey to be approximately $620,000. The BJS will bear all costs of the supplement. The estimate covers the cost for the Census Bureau to develop and integrate the 2008 PPCS electronic instrument into the existing NCVS CAPI instrument; develop data collection procedures/instructions for administering the supplement; conduct interviews from July through the end of December 2008, prepare specifications/programs for the processing of the supplement data; and produce item tallies and other data outputs for the BJS.

15. Reasons for Change in Burden

Not applicable.

16. Project Schedule

The BJS will be responsible for the statistical analysis of the data from the survey. The BJS will publish reports on the results of the survey. It is anticipated that findings from the 2008 PPCS will be disseminated sometime in late 2009 or early 2010. No information will be provided in this report that would reveal the identity of the respondent or any law enforcement officer.

Cognitive testing of the 2008 PPCS supplement questions will be conducted in October through December 2007. Development of the PPCS CAPI instrument will take place from January through April 2008. Actual interviewing for the PPCS will be conducted during July through December 2008. Any post-data collection processing will be performed on a monthly basis once interviewing for a particular month is complete. The minimal processing required for the PPCS will be completed by February 2009. Weighting of the PPCS data will be completed by the end of May 2009. The Census Bureau will prepare and deliver to the BJS a microdata user file with documentation in June 2009.

17. Request to Not Display Expiration Date

The OMB approval number and expiration date will be displayed on the PPCS introduction screen within the CAPI instrument.

18. Exceptions to Certification

There are no exceptions.