From

Houston Industries FAQ page

Will there be natural gas service on January 1, 2000? Interruptions in natural gas service are unusual at any time. All date-sensitive items have been inventoried, tested and corrected all systems, such as process controls, to ensure they are Year 2000 ready. How many embedded systems needed or still need replacement/remediation? Over 3500 systems containing one or more embedded microprocessors have been identified. How many needed or still need replacement/remediation? Approximately 2-4 percent of the items tested to date have been found to have problems, however, many of the problems are minor and can be worked around or ignored. It is probable that less than 1 percent of the items will need to be replaced or upgraded. What is HIs budget for the Y2K project? Approximately $35 to $40 million. How many lines of code needed examining? Approximately 24.5 million lines of code in various computer languages. ----So, what the hell does this mean? What the old saying about baffling them with BS?

-- Other Lisa (LisaWard2@aol.com), February 03, 1999

Answers

Houston Industries owns Arkla Gas (gas utility for Little Rock, AR). I check their FAQ periodically for changes and that's when I decided to post the above snips from it. Then I went to the Arkansas Democrat website (our local paper) to read for a bit and found this article on Arkla Gas in todays' edition

Arkla fashions plan to mend safety problems

Within the article is the following "inquiries revealed that Arkla had failed for years to add odorant to some rural natural gas lines in its Russellville district and falsified records to show that odorant had been added." And we are supposed to just have faith in these companies to be forthright and honest. I seek the "supporting evidence" that De Jager's saying we are ignoring and this is what I find. Contradictory Y2K status information, safety measures being sacrificed for marketing, falsification of records. Yea, the Pollys are right, let's all go back to sleep now. (If anyone knows how to e-mail Gary North, please forward him this. Since he's from Arkansas he might be interested.)

-- Other Lisa (LisaWard2@aol.com), February 03, 1999.

gnorth@garynorth.com (among others)

-- Mutha Nachu (---@sky.com), February 03, 1999.

WOW, there's monkeys flying outta my butt!! (my reaction to being led down the primrose path by lawyers hiding behind public statements)

-- Buffalo Bob (buff@hal.com), February 03, 1999.

Hi Lisa. Kinda hard to tell what's happening with Houston Industries. As of 2/2/99 they changed their name to Reliant Energy (new web site is at Reliant Energy, and is under construction, with no Y2K info. Apparently they are also the parent company of Minnegasco (natural gas provider in Minnesota). According to the info posted at Roleigh Martin's Y2K news page, there seems to be some discrepancies in the reporting. For more info on this, go to:

Rolgeigh Martin

-- Wanda (lonevoice@mailexcite.com), February 03, 1999.

Lisa, lotsa research you're doing lately!

Are you getting ready to make a presentation?

(Actually, GN is a Texan who escaped to Arkansas.)

-- Lisa (lisa@work.com), February 03, 1999.

Lisa: I stand corrected, I knew he was "from" Texas and now lives in Arkansas but said "from" because that is the way we Arkansans talk. Kind of like "fixin to" when we are getting ready to do something, as in "I'm fixin to go to Sam's Club and stock up on toilet paper." That's why Clinton is sometimes half believable when he says "I did not have sexual relations with that woman!" Remember he is from Arkansas!

No solid plans for a presentation yet, other than informal meetings with school and church officials locally. Just doing my homework.

-- Other Lisa (LisaWard2@aol.com), February 03, 1999.

I wrote Hou. Ind (now Reliant Energy) Sept. 98 and got a form letter back....standard..."we're working on it. They baffled me with the letter for sure. I'm also concerned about the Nuclear Plant they have down near Bay City.

-- (cmar1@prodigy.net), February 03, 1999.

Forgot... most like the "hot link" version of things.

gnorth@garynorth.com

or

gnorth@bigfoot.com

-- Mutha Nachu (---@fieldsofgreen.com), February 04, 1999.