1. Governments DivisionPartnering with the SDCsPresented to the SDC Steering CommitteeFebruary 17, 2011 Kimberly Moore Assistant Division Chief, Recurring Programs Christopher Pece Senior Technical Advisor

2. Introduction to Governments Division • Main Purposes of Governments Division programs • Provide economic statistics about governments (approximately 90,000 state and local governments) • Are the public counterpart to business, industry, and services economic data • Follow the activity of governments over time • Response is voluntary • Virtually no confidentiality restrictions

3. Governments Division Programs • Base Programs: Census of Governments/related annual and quarterly programs • Finance Data – revenues, expenditures, debt, & assets • Employment Data – number of employees & payroll • Organizational Data – number of governments & characteristics • Reimbursable Programs • 17 programs conducted on an annual, biannual, or quarterly basis

4. Base Programs

5. Reimbursable Programs

6. Importance of GOVS Data • Tells the story of the fiscal welfare of federal, state, and local government • Constitutes 12 percent of Gross Domestic Product • Are the only source of comprehensive, uniform statistics on governments – we are the gold standard • Helps policy makers make important, informed decisions

7. State Budgets: The Day of Reckoning 60 Minutes, CBS News December 2010

8. How GOVS Collects Data • Paper Form • Web Instrument • Administrative-type Records • Supplemental Sources • Manual compilation of government financial standards • Manual compilation of other available sources (e.g., Mergent’s, Moody’s, other debt-related information)

9. Manual Compilation A Day in the Life of a Governments Division Analyst A Day in the Life of a Governments Division Analyst

10. GOVS /SDC Recent Partnerships • State of Tennessee Data Collection • GOVS U.S. Territories Project

11. Future GOVS/SDC Partnership Opportunities • Increase state and local government response • Advocate GOVS data and educate users • Promote the citation of GOVS data when contacted by media/researchers • Provide feedback on dissemination plans/tools

12. Questions for You • What do you need from us to help you? • What materials can we provide to best explain our data? • How can we best disseminate our data?

13. Questions for Us? Kimberly Moore Assistant Division Chief, Recurring Programs kimberly.p.moore@census.gov 301-763-7643 Christopher Pece Senior Technical Advisor christopher.pece@census.gov 301-763-7330