Ben Franz
03-20-2010, 1:33 PM
Thought I'd post an update on the temp job I described a couple of weeks ago.
Yesterday was the final day of the initial form delivery and address verification operation. I spent three weeks driving around trying to find houses and match up addresses to the computer generated lists and maps. The group I started with finished our area in the first week and a half (east of Albuquerque in a mixed mountain/prairie terrain) and I was asked to go to the Pecos - Las Vegas (NM) area northeast of Santa Fe. A combination of personnel problems, difficult weather and terrain had put that group behind schedule. Workers with 4WD vehicles were given the chance to fill in.
The good news was: no more serious dog encounters, no more firearms displayed, and a chance to visit a beautiful part of the state. The residents tend to be long term, older families rather than the transplant heavy urban areas. I met an older man splitting wood outside his very "rustic" house in a remote valley. He told me that the area used to have 4-500 residents (mostly ranchers, etc.) and that he had been born in the house. I was walking the "road" since the mud was so bad I didn't want to risk driving down the hill - he said if I got stuck he would pull me out. He had the biggest billy goat I've ever seen running around loose - I thought it was a small horse at first. Almost to a person, the people I met were pleasant, helpful and seemed to appreciate the process.
The bad news: MUD!!!! El Nino has delivered a lot of weather to NM this year. Everyone is glad for the moisture but I just wish it would hurry up and soak into aquifers. While it's on the surface, the unpaved roads can become a nightmare. Several workers got stuck (one for 2 days before he could get someone to pull him out). I was only bogged down for 3 hours less than 100' from a packed surface. Many of the roads in higher elevations are closed by the Forest Service or just impassable due to snow.
There were a lot of comments earlier about mail vs. personal distribution of census forms. The in-person operation is used in rural areas where the address system is unreliable. Most urban and suburban areas get their forms by mail. I was amazed at the randomness of property designations - most of the roads I worked were unmarked and few houses had any form of number displayed. How expensive is it to buy some of those red and white numbers for a fence post or gate? The numbering system seems to have been revised several times over and adjacent houses often have numbers that are completely unrelated to each other and even different road names. The GPS mapping project last year was part of a pilot program to evaluate hand-held computer/GPS units for future usage. The current system is very labor intensive and paper based. Most rural areas turned out to be a puzzle - I had to drive the whole area until I found a house number that matched the map and the description (if any) on the list or could find someone home that could verify an address. Then, I could work backwards to match up other houses and figure out which ones weren't listed or which listings were incorrect. It was interesting but somewhat tedious. I don't think I'd sign up again.
Yesterday was the final day of the initial form delivery and address verification operation. I spent three weeks driving around trying to find houses and match up addresses to the computer generated lists and maps. The group I started with finished our area in the first week and a half (east of Albuquerque in a mixed mountain/prairie terrain) and I was asked to go to the Pecos - Las Vegas (NM) area northeast of Santa Fe. A combination of personnel problems, difficult weather and terrain had put that group behind schedule. Workers with 4WD vehicles were given the chance to fill in.
The good news was: no more serious dog encounters, no more firearms displayed, and a chance to visit a beautiful part of the state. The residents tend to be long term, older families rather than the transplant heavy urban areas. I met an older man splitting wood outside his very "rustic" house in a remote valley. He told me that the area used to have 4-500 residents (mostly ranchers, etc.) and that he had been born in the house. I was walking the "road" since the mud was so bad I didn't want to risk driving down the hill - he said if I got stuck he would pull me out. He had the biggest billy goat I've ever seen running around loose - I thought it was a small horse at first. Almost to a person, the people I met were pleasant, helpful and seemed to appreciate the process.
The bad news: MUD!!!! El Nino has delivered a lot of weather to NM this year. Everyone is glad for the moisture but I just wish it would hurry up and soak into aquifers. While it's on the surface, the unpaved roads can become a nightmare. Several workers got stuck (one for 2 days before he could get someone to pull him out). I was only bogged down for 3 hours less than 100' from a packed surface. Many of the roads in higher elevations are closed by the Forest Service or just impassable due to snow.
There were a lot of comments earlier about mail vs. personal distribution of census forms. The in-person operation is used in rural areas where the address system is unreliable. Most urban and suburban areas get their forms by mail. I was amazed at the randomness of property designations - most of the roads I worked were unmarked and few houses had any form of number displayed. How expensive is it to buy some of those red and white numbers for a fence post or gate? The numbering system seems to have been revised several times over and adjacent houses often have numbers that are completely unrelated to each other and even different road names. The GPS mapping project last year was part of a pilot program to evaluate hand-held computer/GPS units for future usage. The current system is very labor intensive and paper based. Most rural areas turned out to be a puzzle - I had to drive the whole area until I found a house number that matched the map and the description (if any) on the list or could find someone home that could verify an address. Then, I could work backwards to match up other houses and figure out which ones weren't listed or which listings were incorrect. It was interesting but somewhat tedious. I don't think I'd sign up again.