Big change coming for Connecticut census data, including ACS

I had a brief meeting yesterday with Jed Kolko, the Under Secretary for Economic Affairs at DOC, during which he alerted me to a major change for CT geography.

As of spring 2022, CT's eight counties have been replaced by nine COGs/Planning Regions. These will be used beginning with ACS and Population Estimates data released next year (ACS 2022 1- and 5-year data). 

The new regions will be treated as "county equivalents" for statistical purposes, although the county-equivalent designation will also make them eligible to apply for federal grant programs open to counties. The new regions will get new FIPS codes.

Obviously this will impact any county (county-equivalent) longitudinal data comparisons for the state. 

I have heard nothing about this until Mr. Kolko told me about it. It seems pretty important though.

Here's a short PDF explaining the change: https://www2.census.gov/geo/pdfs/reference/ct_county_equiv_change.pdf

Much longer FR notice, with a map, population comparisons, and new FIPS codes: https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2022/06/06/2022-12063/change-to-county-equivalents-in-the-state-of-connecticut

-GR

Parents Reply
  • Thanks for the history on the crazy CT geographic areas, Todd. I focus on national issues (as you know), so I hadn't followed any debate about this within the state's data community, but of course my interest was piqued when the Census Bureau announced the change earlier this year. Good point about historical comparison problems in the future!

    Terri Ann

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