1934, it issued the Census Tract Manual, a set of instructions that specified the delineation procedures and prescribed standards such as a minimum population size and acceptable boundaries. Such guidelines assured that data could be gathered and published systematically and consistently for census tracts. The publication of the manual marked an important early effort on the part of the Census Bureau to promulgate its geographic standards at the local level. For further information about the Census Bureau’s geographic standards, see Chapter 2, “Geographic Overview,” and Chapter 10, “Census Tracts and Block Numbering Areas.”
The functions of the committees gradually broadened through introduction by the Census Bureau of additional programs requiring the identification and delineation of new geographic units. One example of this increased local involvement occurred in the 1950s when the Census Bureau asked the Census Tract Committees to expand their functions by designating, for the census of retail trade, the whole census tract (or group of census tracts) that constituted the CBD of each metropolitan area. This expansion in functions was a direct recognition of the valuable work done by the committees on census tracts. Many committees also assisted in identifying MRCs even though these areas did not cover whole census tracts. This function continued with each of the economic censuses through 1982, after which, due to cost considerations, the declining relevance of CBD statistics, and a lack of local interest in identifying MRCs, the Census Bureau discontinued using CBDs and MRCs as standard data reporting units.
For the 1950 census, the Census Bureau officially established the concept of the CDP, then known as an unincorporated place. The Census Bureau consulted with the Census Tract Committees on the identification and delineation of CDPs within their area of jurisdiction for the 1960 census, and included CDP delineation as a standard part of the responsibility of each committee for the geographic preparations in advance of the 1970, 1980, and 1990 censuses.
