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| FSA to close nine Indiana offices, pending USDA OK |
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| By ANN HINCH
Assistant Editor
INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. — It was only about two months ago that Indiana USDA Farm Service Agency (FSA) Executive Director Kenneth Culp announced the proposed closure of 10 FSA county offices and initiated a round of public hearings across the state.
Last Thursday, Culp announced that initial plan will go forth as set out in July, with the exception that the Clay County office will not be closed and consolidated with the Vigo County office in Terre Haute. It will remain open in Brazil, Ind., for the time being – that is, presuming USDA Secretary Mike Johanns approves the plan.
“We’ve got good managers, but we’re driving them, running two offices, and it’s taking a strain on them,” Steve Brown, state FSA executive officer, said of those instances where two offices are under one traveling county director.
He explained the intention of closing each office is to push two understaffed locations together into one central office. This is expected to save FSA more than $100,000 annually per closed office. He added no new people can be hired for understaffed offices to keep them open, because federal funding will not allow for it.
Two months ago, Brown said there would be no reduction in jobs for staff or management, though some directors will be displaced when the closed offices are merged with remaining offices. He said, however, those directors have priority to be hired in a vacant office over other applicants.
Culp added there are five such vacancies and that Brown’s claim about no reduction of jobs still holds true.
The state FSA committee reviewed comments from July public hearings attended by both farmers supporting the consolidations and those who opposed the shutdown of their county offices. Culp said Clay County was spared because it was found to have a higher workload than initially thought.
Other offices also have big workloads, but he said there were “none in that high of a rating.” Out of 80 county offices, he said it ranks in the top 10 for the amount of federal program money to farmers and landowners administrated out of one office.
Morgan, Clay and Vigo counties are now governed by one director, though Morgan is to be consolidated with the Monroe/Owen/Brown counties’ office in Bloomington.
“If we’re in a perfect situation, what we’d like to do is open up Vigo County for another manager” separate from Clay, Culp explained – perhaps in the future. This can’t be done, however, if both counties are run out of the same office.
The final plan submitted to USDA on Aug. 30 consists of the following:
•Consolidate offices for Shelby and Rush counties into one, located in Manilla. These are shared-management counties under the same director. Other similar consolidations are Clark and Scott counties into a Scottsburg office and Pike and Dubois counties into a location to be determined.
•Consolidate Hamilton and Tipton counties into the Tipton office. There are now two separate directors for these offices, but only one will be needed. Other such consolidations are Vanderburgh and Posey counties, into a Mt. Vernon office; Switzerland and Jefferson counties, into a Madison office; and Steuben and DeKalb counties, into an Ashley office.
•Finally, one new office will be created and a director hired for Elkhart and LaGrange counties, which are separately managed with Fulton and Noble counties, respectively. Fulton and Noble will each become stand-alone offices.
According to an FSA press release, once Johanns approves the plan, no offices can be closed for 120 days. Each producer in the affected counties should receive a letter asking if they wish to follow their county office or transfer to a more convenient FSA office in a contiguous county.
Counties to share the same office will each lose its own FSA county committee – only one will be elected to govern both counties. Each committee can still only have 3-5 members.
In July, the House passed a proposed farm bill which contains a provision to keep FSA offices slated for closing, nationwide, open for one more year. It remains to be seen whether the Senate will include the same in its plan when it takes up debate on the issue soon.
An announcement will be issued when Johanns approves this final plan. Brown said it should be uploaded for public viewing, at www.fsa.usda.gov/in
This farm news was published in the Sept. 5, 2007 issue of Farm World, serving Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan and Tennessee. |
| 9/5/2007 |
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