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The New Orleans finance center that processes paychecks for hundreds of thousands of federal employees is flooded from Hurricane Katrina's aftermath and is unlikely to recover in time for the next pay cycle, an Agriculture Department spokesman said Wednesday.

Checks for the approximately 500,000 employees whose pay is usually processed at Agriculture's National Finance Center will be sent from a backup facility in Philadelphia for the next cycle, said Ed Loyd, a department spokesman. He said he was not sure how many of the center's 1,500 employees are in, or on the way to, Philadelphia.

Some of the relocating employees will not have a home when they return to the New Orleans area, Loyd added. "A lot who are there or are on the way...basically all they have is their suitcases," he said.

Meanwhile, the finance center's Web site remained down while agency employees switched online services to Kansas City, where Agriculture runs an information technology center. The malfunction is "part of some of the IT difficulties in transferring everything," Loyd said.

Loyd had no further information on why the site is down, and was not able to say when it will be back up.

COMMENTS

• NFC Analyst, many thanks to all you guys who work at the NFC for getting our pay to us last week, it was very much appreciated by all Federal Employees. Our hopes and prayers are with you and all the NFC family members down in Louisiana hoping they are safe. DHS Employee Davis St John Posted September 4, 2005 11:42 PM
• In response to the 'what genius located a data center in an area below sea level': First of all, The National Finance Center is in eastern New Orleans, right 'NEXT DOOR' to the Michoud Assembly Facility (the people who build like, space shuttles and stuff), and has NEVER come close to the danger and effects of the likes of Katrina. The last hurricane to hit directly in New Orleans that was even CLOSE to Katrina was Hurricane Betsy in 1965 !!!!!! Last time I checked, weather DOES affect other parts of the country now, doesn't it? Snow, mudslides, flooding, earthquakes, tornadoes, and nor'easters can conceivably happen in 'Philly' or Dallas, correct? Also, what is absolutely mind-boggling to me is that many of the storms that hit in the South eventually cause havoc in the northeast as well! They may not be as dangerous wind-wise, but they do still cause this weather phenomenon known as um....gee, uh, let's see, um, could it be - FLOODING!!! And no, we wouldn't be necessarily 'glad' to go to Philadelphia or Dallas. If we had to on a temporary basis, sure; but don't you think that employees temporarily transferred to Philly or Dallas would be worried about their families, and their homes and belongings? (contrary to what you see on CNN, the entire N.O. metro area did NOT get affected like downtown, Orleans Parish, and lower-lying areas did.) New Orleans WILL be rebuilt, and it will be rebuilt right. NFC isn't going anywhere after it is dried out. After all, we aren't due for another direct hit until 2045. Thank you GovExec.com reader Posted September 2, 2005 1:19 AM
• This country's overdependence on foreign oil didn't begin when George Bush was elected President. To blame him for this situation is the height of stupidity, but Bush-haters just want to blame everything in the world on him. Meanwhile, the real reason gas prices are going up so fast is the lack of refinery capacity, as well as environmentalists who refuse to let oil companies drill for oil in Alaska and other areas. Nobody wants a refinery in their neighborhood, so many were located in the Gulf, and were knocked out by Hurricane Katrina. The local service stations make 5 to 7 cents per gallon in my area, and have to pass on their increased costs to their customers. Do you expect them to take a financial hit, and absorb the increases themselves, when they operate on a low profit margin to begin with? It's great to shout for alternative energy sources, but that requires time and research and development money, which nobody in Congress has pushed for unless a disaster occurs, and they sense a photo opportunity. Stop the anti-Bush rants, because you are once again showing your ignorance of the real problems confronting us, which are much more complex than your partisan political agenda. GovExec.com reader Posted September 1, 2005 3:32 PM