James T. Christy has been director of the U.S. Census Bureau's Los Angeles Regional Office since 2002. He oversees census activity in Hawaii and 19 counties in Southern California. The region contains the most populous county in the nation - Los Angeles - at nearly 10 million people.

Christy began his career at Census Bureau headquarters in Suitland, Md., as a statistician evaluating education and expenditure data. He has also worked in the Denver and Kansas City regional offices on a variety of Census Bureau activities. These included working on the 1990 and 2000 censuses and the supervision of data collection for indicators such as the Consumer Price Index, the Monthly Unemployment Rate and Housing Starts.

He has served as chairman of the Greater Los Angeles Federal Executive Board and participates in numerous activities related to public policy issues in Southern California.