The American Community Survey

[Pelenaka]

We got a letter a week ago letting us know that our address not us per say was chosen to partcipate in this survey conducted by the U.S. Dept. of Commerce. This survey is suppose to better help in planning of community resources.
Sure enough the survey came all 28 pages of it asking such questions as; if we have H & C running water(no, only if chased), how many persons dwell in this address & their relationship to each other (depends if our P.O./Warden is reading this), and this is one of the real interesting questions,
" What time did this person usually leave home to go to work LAST WEEK "?
Covert op on my hard cider stores when I'm at work?
Survey also asks for specifics such as work addresses & phone #s, and income amounts.

Reminded me of all the paperwork I had to fill out for a security clearance when I worked in ... ah never mind skip that.

Anyone else get this thick envolope in the mail?
Thoughts?

I was planning on partcipating until I read how envolved the questions are.
About teh only thingit didn't ask was Boxers or briefs.

~~ pelenaka ~~
http://thirtyfivebyninety.blogspot.com/

[Windy in Kansas]

Originally Posted by Pelenaka

About teh only thing it didn't ask was Boxers or briefs.

That is only because this was the initial questionnaire. Wait until you get the full sized one with the real in-depth questions.

Teasing.

[Filas are Prima]

I didn't get the letter-I got the cursed bureaucrat!
And, I was "randomly selected" yet should I refuse to answer their invasion of privacy, could be FINED tens of thousands of $!
The cursed bureaucrat was like flies, or ants, just a constant return of this monster.
Finaly, although he was sternly warned to stay far back from the closed gate, the cursed bureaucrat oozed too close to it, where my ranting dogs managed to rattlesnake strikebite him twice through the gate fence. (ha!)
So, for fear of becomming financialy ruined, I answered abut 5% of the questions, and refused to answer the rest of them. Refused on the grounds that they were an invasion of my Right to privacy.
"Randomly selected", yeah, right-with potential fines of tens of thousands of $ for refusal!
Then, the cursed bureaucrat was like a false face, who would switch personnas from jolly nice guy to curseing bad guy. creepy.
And he was perfectly sincere as he'd tell me that the results of the survey should be important to me, as it determined how much Fed funds would be "given" to my County for mandated programs.....right.
Keep your flyswatter handy, is all I can say!

[momanto]

Yeah We Got The Letter. Intended To Ignore It. Forgot To Tell The Family Members Temporarily Staying In My Little House Next Door They Might Show Up.

They Blabbed It All.......when I Wasn't Home.

[WolfWalksSoftly]

There was a thread about this before, and I copied/ pasted a form letter to use in response to this non-sense . I will search and see if I can find it.

[WolfWalksSoftly]

OK..that didn't take long. here it is.



Here is how you should respond.




August_____, 2008

Certified Mail No. _(Put number on Green Certified Mail)

Census of Agriculture
1201 East 10th Street
Jeffersonville, IN 47132

Re: 2007 Census of Agriculture

Dear United States Department of Agriculture:

I, ___________(First and Last name), have received your 2007 Census of Agriculture. In order that I can make arrangements to settle an obligation which I may have, please document and verify the “obligation” by complying in good faith with this request for validation:

1. On your web site it states that my response is mandatory under Title 7 of the US Code. Title 7, Chapter 55, § 2204g (a) states that the “Secretary of Agriculture shall take a census of agriculture” every fifth year starting in 1998. It states under (1) that anyone who “refuses or willfully gives an answer that is false to a question … shall be fined not more than $500.” There is also reference in (2) that states that anyone “who refuses or willfully neglects to answer a question … shall be fined not more than $100.” Please provide the exact wording in Title 7 that states a response is required.
2. According to the US House of Representatives’ Office of the Law Revision Counsel web site, Title 7 has never been enacted into “positive law.” By not being enacted into “positive law,” Title 7 is considered “prima facie” evidence of the law (1 USC §204), “and are presumed to be the law, but are rebuttable by production of the prior un-repealed acts of Congress at variance with the Code.” Please provide evidence that show that Title 7 has been enacted into law and that it applies to me.
3. Please show justification as to why I, as a Citizen of the sovereign state of______, would be required to respond to a federal agency census that has not been enacted into positive law.

Thank you for your immediate attention and clarity to my request.

Sincerely,


Name
Address
City, State Zip

This form letter was authored by G.B. Oliver, Executive Vice President of The Paragon Foundation. Read more here http://www.paragonfoundation.org/

You can substitute Dept. of Commerce, or any other dept for that matter.
Bottom line is you don't have to fill it out, they don't have jurisdiction to enforce such garbage.

[Jena]

I got one of these before. I refused to answer. When they showed up, I told them to go ahead and arrest/fine me. They won't do it. Can you imagine the press on that one??? They don't have the guts!

Anyways...this is a test of the answerless census. They gather information from other agencies, including the IRS, the post office, schools, anything and anyone else and they already have the info. What they are trying to do is see how accurate they are with the other sources. By comparing your answers with the ones they have, they can judge how effective it is to conduct a census in this way.

I wrote about this on here years ago. I had a link to a federal handbook that laid out all the plans of how they were going to implement this, but I have no idea where it is now.

Jena

[Filas are Prima]

What was so amazeing about the cursed bureaucrat was he truly believed that he was impervious to all laws or decency because he was from the Feds, and "above all laws"..........and when my Fila rattlesnake bit him through the fence, I patted her dear little head and said, "Nice."

[WolfWalksSoftly]

Your Sheriff, is the highest Law Enforcement at the County level. If the Sheriff has not put his departments hands in the Fed's cash pockets, upon request, he could come out and kindly tell the bureaucritter to leave or face arrest.

[morrowsmowers]

We received one of those a year or so ago. Refused to answer it and used it as fire starter material. After a few months, when they realized I hadn't returned the form, a woman called about it. I told her I had received it, wasn't going to answer it, and to forget about it. She got very mad, told me she would fine me $100 per question if not answered. I told her again I was not going to answer. She then said they would come to the house personally to get the answers or levy the fines. No one has come yet. From what I am told, the actual fine is $100 total and so far no one has been fined.

Ken in Glassboro, NJ

[BuckBall]

I received one of these already. Decided to be a smart (insert different word) mouth and wrote "Am not interested in your survey, send this to someone who cares" and with that, I got a nice letter stating they would come over and do it with me...so I wrote them and kindly stated "by all means come over, we will have tea and biscuits" (I'm from the UK)...never heard anything else back from them. My parents and mate thought it was hilarious.

[Pelenaka]

Got the indepth questionare a.k.a. "survey" that Wind was referring to.
Final straw was when it asked if I used Macintosh or Wine Sap for my hard cider.

Smell a coup comming on. Nice flag featuring a Buffalo. Already have a national food - wings. Hmm wonder if I could get Canada to finance a revolution in exchange for outlet mall shopping rights? Bet the Senca Nation would be more than interested.

Seriusly, this survey isn't agriculture based. Not one question if I sold/bought eggs under the table or how much of our income is derived from back alley barter deals involving green leafy vegtables. Just if we rent or own, collect public asstistance, what/where/who & how much we work for.
This leans more toward a burb lifestyle. Maybe that's it, the burbs really are in trouble.

Thanks for the form letter WWS.

~~ pelenaka ~~
who needs to find a good "free" freelance songwriter ... every coup needs a good tune

[Wayne02]

Is this a different survey then the two I threw away from the USDA or some such organization?

[Spinner]

I've got several of the "booklets" in the mail. I tossed most of them, but kept one to reference if I was ask about it. I've still got one of them around here some place. If I remember it also ask a lot of questions about my animals. I remember thinking it might in some way be connected with NAIS.

[woodsrunner]

Originally Posted by morrowsmowers

We received one of those a year or so ago. Refused to answer it and used it as fire starter material. After a few months, when they realized I hadn't returned the form, a woman called about it. I told her I had received it, wasn't going to answer it, and to forget about it. She got very mad, told me she would fine me $100 per question if not answered. I told her again I was not going to answer. She then said they would come to the house personally to get the answers or levy the fines. No one has come yet. From what I am told, the actual fine is $100 total and so far no one has been fined.

Ken in Glassboro, NJ

I would have responded with. "You've just met the legal description for extortion, which is a felony in this state. Could I get your name and dept again?"

[Quint]

They burn quite nicely. I use them to start my trash fires.

[weedlady]

Threw it in the trash when after I read the questions. Got another one because I didn't respond to the first. Threw that away also. Got three telephone calls to which I did not respond. Finally got tired of them calling. Agreed to do the survey over the phone with a very nice lady. Most of my responses were "I refuse to answer that question". She had no argument with that, and that was the last I heard from them.

So that will be my answer on anything I receive in the future.

martha

[CowgirlGloria]

I got this, or something similar. They wanted to know EVERYTHING I grow, including things just for home consumption. They wanted to know what fruits I grow - EVERYTHING. It was a very long booklet, and it would have taken a very long time to wade through and answer, if I chose to do so. But, on the cover of it, it was specifically asking about a farm that I no longer own. Interestingly, they had tracked me down to my new address - I'd moved several times since I had any ownership in that farm.

So, I scrawled across the top of the form that I no longer owned the farm in question, and I mailed it back. i offered no information about my current activities. I've not heard from them since.

[Pony]

Originally Posted by Quint

They burn quite nicely. I use them to start my trash fires.

Compost really nice, too, once you put them through the shredder.

So I'm told...

[Dave]

I've been ignoring these government censuses and turning away their agents for 20 years. It's been a while so I think they've given up.

I'm still waiting to be fined.