SAS cutting off string during data recode -

on dataset created by:

data voa;     input address $50.;     input city $1-15 state $16-17 zip;     input latitude longitude;     datalines; 1675 c street, suite 201 anchorage      ak  99501     61.21       -149.89 600 azalea road mobile         al  36609 30.65       -88.15   

i'm attempting add new variable essential recoding of long , lat, so:

data voa1;     set voa;     if longitude < -110 region = "west";     if latitude > 40 , longitude < -90 , longitude > -110 region = "mid-west";     if latitude > 40 , longitude > -90 region = "north-east";     if latitude < 40 , longitude < -110 region = "south"; run; 

unfortunately, seems sas cutting strings short , leaving them @ 4 characters (e.g. "mid-west" becomes "mid-"). if had guess assume because sas assigns number of bytes each value in column based on first value in column, , doesn't dynamically modify number of bytes based on new values. how fix this?

note: think potential fix might putting longest potential output (in case "north-east") first, seems inelegant solution.

one of nice features of sas not forced define variables before using them. if don't define variable sas must make guess @ meant code write. in case since first reference new variable region in assignment statement:

region = "west" 

sas makes logical decision define character variable of length 4.

to fix add length statement before first if statement.

length region $10;