"Hi-Tech Census Costs, Accuracy in Doubt"

[suffragette]

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hmjmaJhTzEvdVQk7iLgZ08Aq36GAD8VKN52G0

Now, officials say, technology problems could add as much as $2 billion to the cost of the 2010 census and jeopardize the accuracy of the nation's most important survey.

Census officials are considering a return to using paper and pencil to count every man, woman and child in the nation.

~snip~

The success — or failure — of the census could have widespread repercussions. The Constitution has required a census every 10 years since the first one in 1790. It is used to apportion the 435 seats in the House of Representatives among the states. And states and many cities use census data to draw legislative districts.

Population numbers are used to calculate billions in state and federal grants for transportation, education and other programs. Private businesses use census data to identify labor and consumer markets.

Hmmm, so technology problems have led to inaccuracies with the count and they are now looking at going back to hand counted paper.

This sounds familiar. Ramifications for arguing for voting process changes, anyone?

Also, I wonder how this will impact the apportionment of Representatives and districts. I know a lot of gerrymandering was done by the Republicans in the last few years. Remember the whole Texas debacle with the Republicans using the Dept. of Homeland Security to hunt down the Democrats when they protested.

Anyone better at this than me have ideas about the impact of this?