A puzzling question swirling around Albany is what has happened to William Howard, Governor Spitzer’s ousted liaison to the state police who is caught up in the scandal surrounding the administration’s plot to smear the Republican Senate majority leader, Joseph Bruno.

After Attorney General Cuomo issued a report faulting Mr. Howard for directing the state police superintendent to dig up select and private information about Mr. Bruno’s travel schedule for the purposes of publicizing it, Mr. Spitzer announced that Mr. Howard would be “reassigned to a position outside of the governor’s office.”

Almost two weeks later, Mr. Howard is in limbo while he collects a reported salary of $175,900 from the State University of New York, where SUNY officials say he is technically employed as the director of the so-called Center of Homeland Security Research, Training, and Education at the University at Albany.

A spokesman, David Henahan, said SUNY established the center in January and tapped Mr. Howard, who served as Governor Pataki’s first deputy chief of staff in charge of emergency responses for floods and other disasters, to be its first director.

Shortly after he joined the center, the Spitzer administration asked SUNY to loan Mr. Howard to the executive branch for six months to serve as the governor’s assistant deputy secretary for homeland security under Michael Balboni, Mr. Henahan said. Before news of the scandal broke last month, the administration extended Mr. Howard’s temporary assignment for six months.

A Spitzer official said the administration plans to announce Mr. Howard’s reassignment “soon.” Mr. Henahan said the university system is unsure of when or if Mr. Howard will return to campus. “We have not received an update on his status,” he said.

One source of confusion in the effort under way to find Mr. Howard a new job appears to revolve around the homeland security center, about which very little is known.

Mr. Henahan provided a vague description of the center, which doesn’t have a Web site or apparently even a phone number. A Web search regarding the center did not turn up any information.

Asked what it does, Mr. Henahan said it “provides a focal point to undertake long- and short-term initiatives beneficial to the university and the state.” In a later conversation, Mr. Henahan said the center “will support faculty who have organized efforts to secure grant support and also provide a contact point for external entities who are seeking SUNY faculty in the area of homeland security.”

Mr. Henahan said the center is currently led by Rick Mathews, who is listed on the University at Albany’s online directory as “assistant director” at the “National Center — Homeland Security Studies.” Asked for the center’s phone number, Mr. Henahan provided a number at which he said Mr. Mathews could be reached. The number he supplied is the switchboard of the Center for Legislative Development, a policy school at the University at Albany. Mr. Mathews could not be reached at the number early yesterday evening.

Asked how many people the center employed, Mr. Henahan said he “doesn’t think it’s very many.” He also said he didn’t know how it was funded.

The lack of information about the center has fueled suspicion among Senate Republicans about Mr. Howard’s post at SUNY.

“It certainly raises questions in the Senate as to what they do, whether it performs a function, and whether it should be funded in the future,” a high-level Senate source said. “Is it a state-funded slot? Was it created just for Howard? Does it perform any function, or was it just created to give him a place to land?”

Mr. Howard was one of two people whom the governor disciplined for their involvement in the plot to politically harm Mr. Bruno by leaking information about his use of security escorts on days he traveled to fund raisers. The other was Darren Dopp, Mr. Spitzer’s communications director, who was suspended indefinitely.

A report issued last month by Mr. Cuomo’s office found that Mr. Howard “apparently told” the acting police superintendent, Preston Felton, that the “Governor’s Office had received a FOIL request for records concerning Senator Bruno’s travel. At the request of Howard, the Superintendent began informing Howard about Senator Bruno’s planned and actual movements in New York City for trips certified to be for ‘legislative business.'”

The report said Mr. Howard, who was the only administration official who agreed to testify before investigators, asked Mr. Felton “to provide ground transportation information for only three of those trips, each of which occurred on days when well-publicized political fundraisers were held.”

Mr. Howard testified that he “asked for the scheduling information at Dopp’s request,” the report said. He also told investigators that he believed that a reporter from the Times Union of Albany had requested itineraries for Mr. Bruno after “reviewing documents he had received under the FOIL request,” referring to the state’s Freedom of Information Law.

The report then charged that Mr. Howard’s statement was “plainly wrong,” citing an e-mail message that Mr. Howard wrote to Mr. Spitzer’s chief of staff, Richard Baum, weeks before the Time Union had submitted its FOIL request that apparently discussed an effort under way to seek Mr. Bruno’s travel records.