The agency that oversees US social security programs has bought a property in Urbana, Maryland, where it plans to build a data center, local Maryland news paper Gazette reported.

The future facility will replace the Social Security Administration's existing National Computer Center in Baltimore, Maryland, which, according to an oversight agency's audit, is quickly running out of capacity.

Report on the audit, conducted by the SSA Inspector General's office, said the existing facility would not be able to support the administration's expanding capacity requirements by 2012, while the new data center would not be completed until 2015.

The property SSA chose is part of the Urbana Corporate Center, a large campus that is also home to a 60,000 sq ft Fannie Mae data center. Fannie Mae provides housing loans to lower-income Americans.

The project to build the 300,000 sq ft data center has been estimated to cost more than US$700m, most of which was allocated by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

Laurie Boyer, executive director of a local economic development agency, told the Gazette that it took a lot of hard work by local officials to pitch the Corporate Center as a location for SSA.

"We're happy to see the Social Security Administration move forward with acquiring the land that will house the building," she said, adding that the project would create 200 permanent jobs in addition to temporary construction jobs.

SSA chose Urbana after a protracted site-selection process that narrowed location choices from 150 to two about one year ago. Alternative to Urbana was another city in Maryland called Woodlawn ÔÇô home to the administration's headquarters.