Flurry of Numbers : San Diego Facility Readies to Sort, Count 16 Million Census Forms From 4 States

Perhaps it is inevitable that a man who is preparing for the arrival of 16 million census questionnaires at a Sorrento Valley warehouse would have numbers on his mind.

So it was altogether fitting that Greg Nowakowski--who in less than two months will be surrounded by an avalanche of data on what people earn, spend on housing, their number of children and myriad other details that chronicle life in America--heralded Wednesday’s open house at the San Diego census processing center by spewing out a torrent of statistics not unlike those that will race through his high-speed computers this spring.

To succinctly--if, perhaps, somewhat confusingly--summarize what Nowakowski, the center’s manager, had to say: 16 million census forms from four states will be counted by 1,200 San Diego workers who will use 300 computer terminals, 11 high-speed cameras--each capable of microfilming up to 2,400 questionnaires an hour--and an estimated 4.6 million feet of film to prepare the data for the FOSDIC (Film Optical Sensing Device for Input to Computer).

All of this will take place in a 128,500-square-foot building longer than two football fields (or, to put it another way, more ground than the Chargers typically cover in a game), after which the forms--most Americans will receive a 14-question short form, while one in six households will get the 59-question long version--will be stored in a secure facility in Kansas for 72 years to protect confidentiality.

And that was only a small portion of the statistical flurry that Nowakowski--a man of few words but of many numbers--unleashed Wednesday to describe the massive counting task that will begin in April.

One of only seven census processing offices in the country, the San Diego facility will handle census questionnaires from residents of California, Washington, Alaska and Hawaii.

Selected because of its availability of relatively inexpensive office space and ready labor pool for the 1,200 temporary jobs needed for the decennial population count, San Diego, like the other processing offices, will oversee the five-step high-tech process--human hands do little other than feed the material into computers or other equipment--in which the information on the paper questionnaires is transferred onto microfilm and, later, computer tapes.

Due to security considerations, Wednesday’s open house likely will be the only time that either the public or the press will have access to the processing center.

Marked by rah-rah enthusiasm with a patriotic twist--red, white and blue balloons were much in evidence, and a bureau handout noted that the census is “a small patriotic duty to perform once every 10 years”--the event also was used by census officials both to allay apprehensions, particularly among minorities, about the process and to try to attract applicants for the local census jobs.

An analysis of the 1980 census concluded that about 1.4% of the American population was not counted, with that so-called “undercount” distributed among various minority groups, according to John Reeder Jr., the Census Bureau’s regional director. While 100% of the white population was counted, officials estimate that 5.9% of both the black and Latino populations were missed in the last census.

This year, officials hope to reduce that undercount through an aggressive advertising campaign involving minority firms, combined with a persistent emphasis on the confidentiality of the census information.

Recognizing that some people’s reluctance to return census questionnaires stems from skepticism over the government’s need for such detailed information about their personal lives, officials constantly stress that, as San Diego census spokesman Dan Conway put it, the material is “not used for taxation, regulation or investigation.”

Although the statistical data is used to reapportion the U.S. House of Representatives, to redraw state and local legislative districts and to allocate more than $37 billion in federal funds annually, individuals’ specific questionnaires will be available only to their families until the year 2062.

“No one--not the INS or the FBI or the IRS--gets that information,” Nowakowski said. “We take the confidentiality very, very seriously.”

Of the 1,200 temporary census jobs available here, most are for clerical and data entry positions that pay between $5.50 and $8.60 an hour. Most of the jobs will last for about four months, though some will be filled for up to a year, according to recruiting director John Ramirez Jr.

Estimating that nearly two-thirds of the 16 million questionnaires will be returned within three weeks of being mailed out on March 23, census officials believe that the San Diego office’s peak period will be in late April and May. If individuals do not return their census forms by May 1, their homes will be visited by “street counters,” whose job is to ensure that the final count comes as close to measuring 100% of the population as possible.

“We’d like for them to have no work,” Reeder said, only half-joking.

There will be plenty of work, however, for the employees inside the census processing plant once the questionnaires begin arriving. Just how big is that job? Let Nowakowski--with yet another statistic--answer that question.

If the 16 million paper questionnaires were laid end to end, Nowakowski explained, they would stretch from San Diego to Washington, D.C., and back.

You can count on it.