by Meghan Maury

Census of the Decade: Decennial Census of the Population of Americans; Proposed Residence Criteria and Proposed Regulations for Demographic Questions. The Census Bureau is proposing sweeping changes to the 2030 Census that would fundamentally change both who is counted for political representation and what demographic information the census collects. Most significantly, Census would exclude from the population used to apportion seats in Congress anyone who is neither a U.S. citizen nor a lawful permanent resident, including undocumented migrants and many people lawfully living in the country on temporary statuses. Census would determine immigration status using administrative records from across the federal government and other sources and is also considering adding a legal-status question to the census questionnaire. The rule would separately prohibit the decennial census from asking about race, ethnicity, or sexual orientation, eliminating the race and ethnicity data historically used for redistricting, civil-rights enforcement, research, and allocation of public resources. Census says it could continue collecting demographic information through the American Community Survey and obtaining it from administrative records. The proposal would also substantially increase Census's reliance on tax and other administrative records to determine where people should be counted.
Comments due October 13 November 2. For more info and resources to help write your comment, visit handsoffourcens.us

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Note: The Take Action tab of dataindex.us provides information about even more surveys, forms, evaluations, and records notices than are listed in your weekly newsletter.

Equity + Civil Rights

  • National Health Service Corps Loan Repayment Programs. HRSA is revising National Health Service Corps loan repayment applications to replace “disadvantaged background” with “vulnerable background” when determining eligibility for a statutory funding priority. The new framework emphasizes educational, geographic, and economic vulnerability, using indicators such as poverty, first-generation college attendance, under-resourced schools, language barriers, disability, and rural or isolated communities. The change continues HRSA’s broader shift away from “disadvantaged” terminology toward more specific socioeconomic and geographic measures of vulnerability.
    Comments due October 27.

  • Nondiscrimination in Federal Financial Assistance Programs. GSA is proposing unspecified revisions to two forms used to collect civil-rights compliance information from state agencies that receive and distribute federal surplus property. The forms collect information on discrimination complaints and findings and accessibility for people with disabilities, but GSA does not explain what it proposes to change and has not made the revised forms available with the notice.
    Comments due October 26.

Waste, Fraud, and Abuse (WFA)

  • Medicaid Drug Use Review (DUR) Program. CMS is renewing its Medicaid Drug Use Review (DUR) data collection, part of a longstanding program requiring state Medicaid agencies and managed care plans to analyze prescription claims for potentially inappropriate or medically unnecessary care, fraud, abuse, and unusual prescribing, dispensing, or patient behavior. States use claims data to identify prescribing patterns and potential problems and may intervene with individual physicians or pharmacists; they also report annually to CMS on their DUR activities. The collection has legitimate patient-safety and program-integrity purposes, but the breadth of the underlying claims analysis is notable as HHS increasingly uses claims data and fraud authorities to scrutinize politically targeted forms of care. The same infrastructure could potentially be used to identify and investigate providers or prescribing patterns involving gender-affirming care or other disfavored treatments, although this notice does not itself propose such targeting or create a new prescription-claims database.
    Comments due October 20.

Science and Technology

  • Application for Competitive Grant Program. NTIA is revising the application for the Digital Equity Competitive Grant Program, which funds projects addressing barriers to broadband adoption, digital skills, and access to connectivity. Notably, NTIA has renamed the program the “Competitive Grant Program” in this notice and removed “digital equity” from its description, even though the underlying statute still establishes the Digital Equity Competitive Grant Program to advance digital equity and inclusion among specified underserved populations. NTIA identifies this as a revision of the existing collection but has not yet published the revised forms, so it is not yet clear what substantive application requirements may also change.
    Comments due October 26.

  • 2027 National Training, Education, and Workforce Survey. NSF is reinstating and substantially expanding the National Training, Education, and Workforce Survey for 2027, combining it with two longstanding surveys of college graduates and doctorate recipients to create a single source of data on Americans’ education, training, employment, and pathways into science, engineering, and skilled technical work. The consolidated questionnaire has been tested, but the notice does not provide enough detail to assess how individual questions or measures will change.
    Comments due October 27.

Data Sharing

  • Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS) benefits. OPM is re-establishing a data-sharing agreement with the Social Security Administration to match certain FERS disability and survivor annuitants against Social Security benefit records. OPM will use the results to determine eligibility for federal retirement benefits and calculate statutory offsets based on Social Security payments.
    Comments due October 27.

Economy

  • Business Trends and Outlook Survey. Census is proposing several additions to the Business Trends and Outlook Survey (BTOS), its high-frequency survey of U.S. businesses and economic conditions. Census would repeat and revise a supplemental set of questions about businesses’ use of artificial intelligence and add permanent questions measuring use of generative AI and AI’s effects on both existing employment and new hiring. It would also add a new question measuring businesses’ uncertainty about future conditions. Census is exploring whether to publish AI-related data more frequently than annually as businesses’ use of the technology changes.
    Comments due October 9.

Veterans

  • Application for Disability Compensation Benefits. VA is substantially simplifying the application veterans use to seek disability compensation, cutting Form 21-526EZ from 15 pages to five and estimating that it will take about 15 rather than 25 minutes to complete. The redesign removes most detailed instructions and directs applicants to online guidance, eliminates several duplicative or nonessential questions, and simplifies reporting of medical treatment and service information. VA is also eliminating the form’s dedicated section on toxic and other military exposures, which it says caused confusion and administrative burden; veterans would instead describe any relevant exposure, event, or injury as part of the explanation for each disability they claim. The revised form also adds a way for veterans experiencing or at risk of homelessness to identify themselves and request priority processing.
    Comments due October 9.

  • Application for D.I.C., Survivors Pension, and/or Accrued Benefits. VA is substantially simplifying the application used by surviving spouses and children to apply for Dependency and Indemnity Compensation (DIC), Survivors Pension, and accrued veterans' benefits, cutting Form 21P-534EZ from 20 pages to seven and reducing its estimated completion time from 40 to 25 minutes. The redesign removes or consolidates some questions and cuts nine pages of instructions down to one, directing applicants to online resources for more detailed information about eligibility and required evidence. The revised form continues to collect detailed information needed to determine benefits, including family relationships and, for Survivors Pension, income, assets, medical and end-of-life expenses, and costs for in-home or residential care.
    Comments due October 9.

ICYMI

  • Termination: Annual Survey of State Government Tax Collections. Census is ending the Annual Survey of State Government Tax Collections after the 2025 data release, saying it duplicates tax data available through other Census programs. The same five broad tax categories and up to 25 subcategories will continue to be published through the Annual Survey of State Government Finances, while Census will also begin producing annualized estimates from its quarterly tax survey in 2027.