pre-2013 ACS5 Block Group Data Error

[dbernstein-healthier]

I am getting an error when trying to pull ACS 5-year estimates for block groups for any year prior to 2013. Other geographies work fine.

When I run the below code, I get the error:
error: unknown/unsupported geography heirarchy

example:

COLUMNS = ['C15002I_008E']
COUNTY_NUMBER = '157' # shelby county
year = 2012
columns_to_pull = ['GEO_ID', 'NAME', 'C15002I_008E']
block_group_data = c.acs5.state_county_blockgroup(columns_to_pull, states.TN.fips, COUNTY_NUMBER, Census.ALL, year=year)

The documentation indicates that ACS5 is available for 2009 onward.

Any thoughts on what is going on?

[mdp0023]

Running into the same issue, trying to pull ACS5-year data for 2011 and 2012. Were you able to resolve this?

[JavadocMD]

Block group geography is not available in the Census API until 2013, so "unsupported geography hierarchy" is correct. You can see the 2013 geography doc includes state › county › tract › block group while 2012 geography only includes state › county › tract.

I believe the only way to get block group data prior to 2013 is to download and process the sequence-based summary files.