# Interagency Council on Statistical Policy (ICSP) The coordinating body of the federal statistical system, chaired by the [[Chief Statistician of the United States]] inside the [[Office of Management and Budget]]. It began in 1989 as an informal forum for the heads of the principal statistical agencies. The 1995 [[Paperwork Reduction Act]] gave it a statutory basis (44 U.S.C. § 3504(e)(8)), with the job of advising OMB on statistical policy and coordination. ## Who sits on it The [[Foundations for Evidence-Based Policymaking Act]] (2018) widened membership beyond the thirteen principal statistical agencies to include the **Statistical Officials** that each of the 24 major agencies must designate. Eleven of those Statistical Officials also head a statistical agency. As of September 2026 the council has **thirty members**. OMB's own public roster had fallen out of date, still listing leadership that had already changed ([[Federal Statistical System Tree]]). ## What it does The council **advises; it does not direct.** It charters subcommittees on the [[American Community Survey]], the [[Federal Statistical Research Data Centers]], the National Secure Data Service, Statistical Official duties, and the [[Standard Application Process]], the single portal researchers use to request restricted data from any recognized statistical agency ([[Census Data Access Crosswalk]]). ## Why it matters here The ICSP is the closest thing the decentralized statistical system has to a collective voice, and it has no power of its own. Its chair holds no fixed term, is not Senate-confirmed, and changed twice between July 2025 and January 2026. Its members serve at the pleasure of the departments that house them. When the pressures of 2025–2026 landed (the BLS firing, the census advisory committees disbanded, the Commerce disclosure order), the body that could have spoken for the system as a whole could only coordinate ([[The Politics of Official Statistics]]). ## See also - [[Federal Statistical System Tree]] · [[Chief Statistician of the United States]] · [[Statistical Policy Directive No. 1]] - [[Foundations for Evidence-Based Policymaking Act]] · [[Confidential Information Protection and Statistical Efficiency Act]] · [[Standard Application Process]]