Newsletter Archive
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How You Can (and should) Shape Federal Data Collections
October 17, 2025by Meghan Maury and Christopher MarcumRead MoreThe dataindex.us project revels in revealing insights into federal data - and who gets to influence them. Every survey you fill out, every federal form you complete, and every dataset you use has a backstory. Each one went through a careful and surprisingly democratic process before the first question was ever asked. Often, individuals and organizations are part of that backstory and have a voice in how the government collects and shares data.
This process, established by the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA), gives the public the opportunity to weigh in on how - and whether - the federal government collects data. It’s an underappreciated part of how democracy functions: ordinary people help shape the information the government uses to make decisions about everything from school funding to disaster relief.
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Take Action! Conservation and Landscape Health Rule and More
October 09, 2025by Meghan MauryRead MoreData Regulation of the Week: Rescission of Conservation and Landscape Health Rule. DOI's Bureau of Land Management is proposing to rescind the 2024 Conservation and Landscape Health Rule, which in addition to requiring the protection of intact landscapes and restoring degraded habitat ecosystems, mandated the use of science and data as the foundation for management decisions across all plans and programs.
Comments due Nov. 10.Every time the government makes a change to a survey or a form — or introduces a new survey or form — you have the right to weigh in on that decision. The Take Action! newsletter highlights surveys or forms the government is changing, renewing, or introducing. Click the links to tell the government what you think about the changes they are making.
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Census 2020: Fraud or Fairly Conducted?
October 08, 2025by Beth Jarosz, Chris Dick, and Dorian CaalRead MoreRecently, Senator Banks from Indiana took to social media to criticize the quality of the 2020 Census. In this post, he said that “The 2020 Census was a fraud. The Biden admin used a shady “privacy” formula that scrambled the data and miscounted 14 states. It included illegal immigrants and handed Democrats extra seats. Americans deserve a fair count…”
There was also an attached letter to Commerce Secretary Lutnick, which went into a bit more detail, but basically covered the above points. The post and letter are a lot to unpack, and our goal here at dataindex.us is to monitor the status of federal data. To this end, the three of us, representing over 5 decades of experience as statistical and policy professionals involved in the general field of enumerating the population, wanted to make sure the public has the facts.
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Data Demands Put State FEMA Funds at Risk
October 05, 2025by Mark Gross, Chris Dick, and Beth JaroszRead MoreDemography has historically been a quiet field with little time in the national spotlight. Between the three of us, we have spent nearly 5 decades working at the nexus of applied demographic modeling and public policy. We have built population estimates for the United States Census Bureau (Chris and Mark), built population estimates and forecasts outside of government (Beth and Chris), and have advocated for improvements in population estimation at both the federal and state levels (Beth and Chris). However, even with all of our combined experience, we were surprised by the news this week.
According to reporting from CNN, and confirmed through conversations we’ve had with state demographers, in order to receive FEMA Emergency Management Performance Grants, states “must now submit a population certification as of September 30 detailing their methodology and confirming that individuals removed under US immigration laws are not included in the tally.”
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What the Government Shutdown Means for Federal Information Collections and Data
October 02, 2025Read Morea discussion between Beth Jarosz and Christopher Marcum
Beth: Here at dataindex.us we are always keyed into the heartbeat of the federal data collection process. However, even our team found ourselves wondering what would happen during the government shutdown to federal information collections and data. To that end, we have brought in our friend and colleague, Chris Marcum to answer a few questions. I’ve known Chris since we were both graduate students at the University of California, Irvine and he has had a fascinating career in public service. Most salient for our discussion today, Chris was a senior statistician and scientist at the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) at OMB, where the Information Collection Request (ICR) process is governed through the Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA). (This conversation focuses mainly on data collected through forms and surveys and subject to the PRA, not other types of data like those collected through streamwater sensors or satellites.)