Census Bureau says investigation cost $1.8 million

Responding to a Democratic request for a cost estimate, acting Census Bureau Director William Barron has reported that it cost $1.8 million to sort, transport and store 2000 decennial census questionnaires from 15 local census offices targeted for investigation by the House Government Reform Census Subcommittee. Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., who served as the subcommittee's ranking member last year, had questioned the necessity of holding onto the forms, which contain sensitive information and need to be kept secure. In a letter written Tuesday and made public Wednesday, Barron wrote that the bureau spent $1.8 million to safeguard the forms, prompting a Maloney aide to ask, "What did we get for $1.8 million?" As part of his oversight of the census, Subcommittee Chairman Dan Miller, R-Fla., had requested that the forms not be destroyed while his panel and the bureau's inspector general reviewed reports last summer of fraud and rushed work. Miller defended the request in a statement, contending that the 2000 census was the most accurate one ever conducted.