AHS Age Restricted Living Screening Plan

8/19/2010

Request for OMB Clearance for 2011 AHS Age Restricted Living Screening Procedure

The Census Bureau plans a screening operation to add housing units in independent and assisted living facilities to the American Housing Survey (AHS) sample under the generic clearance for the Master Address File (MAF) and Topologically Integrated Geographic Encoding and Referencing (TIGER) update activities (OMB number 0607 - 0809, expiration date 3/31/2013). We define an independent and assisted living facility as a building with 5 or more housing units whose residents live independently and are generally self sufficient but are able to get help with services like meals, transportation, and managing finances, as well as personal care such as bathing, eating, or dressing. The residents tend to be elderly but also include the disabled of all ages. See Attachment 1 for a copy of the screening questionnaire.

There are potentially 599 independent and assisted living units in sample for the 2011 AHS, which we will screen from the Census Bureau’s Regional Offices September 6 - October 8, 2010. The Regional Office Supervisors and a small team will telephone the facility contacts to confirm the status of the units. We will never contact the housing unit itself for this information. We expect the screening questions to take about 6 minutes once a contact person is located which equates to total respondent burden of 60 hours.

All information that identifies individuals will be held in strict confidence according to the provisions of Title 13, United States Code, Section 9. When contact is made, Regional Office Supervisors and team members will read the statement in Attachment 2 that provides information on the confidential nature of Census Bureau data. This notice explains that any information given to the Census Bureau will be held in strict confidence. None of the questions asked during the screening are of a sensitive nature and there is no cost to facilities other than that of staff time to respond.

The contact person for questions regarding this operation is:

Joseph Huesman

Chief, Housing Surveys Branch

Demographic Surveys Division

Washington, DC 20233

(301) 763-4822