Senators Hear About Y2K Readiness

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Doesn't this story contradict the GAO report on cities y2k preparedness?

By MELISSA B. ROBINSON Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) - The National League of Cities says the vast majority of cities, based on a recent survey, expect to be ready for any computer glitches that may occur in the new year. But some senators are skeptical.

A recent survey of 403 large and small cities by the league found that 92 percent of respondents said that all critical systems would be Y2K compliant by Jan. 1.

Cities identified their top four critical systems as public safety, including emergency management and jails; water and wastewater treatment; utilities; and finance.

``We're ready,'' said Brian O'Neill, a Philadelphia councilman who testified on behalf of the league Thursday at a Senate hearing on state and local Y2K preparedness.

Another 8 percent said their readiness will be 80 percent to 90 percent complete, and 81 percent expected to have contingency plans completed by Sept. 1.

The Y2K problem may occur in computers and microchips programmed to recognize only the last two digits of a year. They may malfunction if they misread the year 2000 as 1900, possibly disrupting basic civil services such as tax and garbage collection, police and fire response, and water treatment.

Senate Y2K Committee Chairman Robert Bennett, R-Utah, said the cities' compliance rate sounds good. But 8 percent still means more than 1,400 localities won't be fully ready.

``We all hope that the city or town where we live is not among those,'' he said.

Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., the committee's top Democrat, warned cities and counties about delaying Y2K work until late in the year.

``Anyone who thinks they're going to get ready between October and December is traveling in a fantasy world,'' Dodd said at the hearing. ``You'd better have a contingency plan.''

Some witnesses said Y2K readiness may not be a major issue in very small or rural counties, where much business is still conducted on paper. Others, though, warned that conditions could be worse than surveys reflect, if only because municipal workers may hesitate to report Y2K planning failures to their superiors.

The league of cities didn't independently verify its survey results, which were more optimistic than a report released Thursday by Congress' investigatory arm, the General Accounting Office.

GAO found that nearly half the nation's 21 largest cities won't complete work on coping with the Y2K computer bug until the final quarter of the year. Just two cities, Dallas and Boston, have finished preparations. Nine others expect to be fully ready by Sept. 30, and 10 cities say they will be ready between Oct. 1 and the end of the year.

``A lot of people lie about their Y2K compliance,'' said Randy Johnson, chairman of the Hennepin County, Minn., board of commissioners. ``It's much easier to say, 'Yeah, we're doing it, don't worry about it.'''

The association's April survey of 500 randomly selected counties found that 51 percent of respondents were finished with Y2K assessments, and 31 percent were mostly finished with testing.

-- y2k dave (xsdaa111@hotmail.com), July 16, 1999

Answers

Thanks y2kDave, here is what caught my eye:

"A recent survey of 403 large and small cities by the league found that 92 percent of respondents said that all critical systems would be Y2K compliant by Jan. 1. "

92% of respondents ..... without knowing how many cities responded the rest of the stats would be relatively meaningless.

Ray

-- Ray (ray@totacc.com), July 16, 1999.


"A recent survey of 403 large and small cities by the league found that 92 percent of respondents said that all critical systems would be Y2K compliant by Jan. 1."

How many cities are there? 5,000+? My old Rand McNally lists populations for "nearly 18,000 cities and counties". Oh, I see above it says that 8% = 1400. So they surveyed 403 out of 17,500 "localities" or ~2%. They surveyed 403 - not clear if 403 is the number that responded, or some smaller number of that 403 responded.

"...92 percent of respondents SAID that all critical systems would be Y2K compliant by Jan. 1. "

Well, so what? Last summer everyone... EVERYONE.. SAID they would be ready - no wait, at that time they SAID they expected to be totally COMPLIANT - by Dec. 31st, 1998.. "leaving a full year for testing" - remember?

So what do we conclude about the 8% who don't even expect to have their critical systems "ready" by 1/1/2000? Too stupid to give the standard answer when nobody was going to check anyway? Or are they the 8% trying to give an honest answer.. and might they be further along than the 92% giving the standard don't-worry-be-happy answer?

Last sentence above:

"The association's April survey of 500 randomly selected counties found that 51 percent of respondents were finished with Y2K assessments, and 31 percent were mostly finished with testing."

49% haven't even finished ASSESSMENT?!!!

Sigh.

Say... can anyone provide the link to the thread discussing the GAO report that included the May 25th Dallas Morning News report saying they had 6 - 7 months more work to do? I can't seem to find that thread, and I want to refer to that article again. Help!

-- Linda (lwmb@psln.com), July 16, 1999.


Linda,

Here's the link to the May 25th article about Dallas:

http://www.dallasnews.com/metro/0525met60cityy2k.htm

-- Linkmeister (link@librarian.edu), July 16, 1999.


Bless you. That was the link to the article (which I needed - thanks). But wasn't there also a discussion thread that included it? Can't seem to find it? Was it pulled?

-- Linda (lwmb@psln.com), July 16, 1999.

Linda,

Here's the link to the thread:

http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=0015RQ

-- Linkmeister (link@librarian.edu), July 16, 1999.



That was supposed to be a hot link. Let's try it again...

http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=0015RQ

-- Linkmeister (link@librarian.edu), July 16, 1999.


Merci boucoup!

I had done a search for GAO (of course), but somehow overlooked it.

-- Linda (lwmb@psln.com), July 16, 1999.


Now I see my problem.. it had scrolled off the list, and was put in UNCATAGORIZED. I looked in every catagory I could think of - GOVERNMENT - was the first that came to mind.

Thanks for digging it up for me.

-- Linda (lwmb@psln.com), July 16, 1999.


I've just found out that my city's Information Services Director quit a couple of months ago and the job is still unfilled. . .

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), July 16, 1999.

OldGit... City? Not a big one I hope.

Reminds me... wonder if the Senate has approved the new (Little Rock native) NCR chairperson?

-- Linda (lwmb@psln.com), July 17, 1999.



NCR? How about NRC.

How about I call it a night before it gets any worse. (my spelling?... the news?.. both!)

-- Linda (lwmb@psln.com), July 17, 1999.


Linda, at the y2k Community Conversation in Austin, Koskinen stated that 25% of the counties in the country had no y2k plan at all. He went on later to say that if we had problems in 100, 200 communities we might be able to handle it, but if we had problems in 700, 1000 communities clearly we didn't have enough personnel in FEMA to deal with it. Do you know how many counties there are total?

-- Mommacares (harringtondesignX@earthlink.net), July 17, 1999.

Mommacares... I FOUND IT!! Here's an article from Dec. 1998 that talks about how few COUNTIES are prepared. It says there are 3.069 counties in the nation. Here's the article if you want to see how the situation looked in Dec.

ABOUT HALF OF ALL U.S. COUNTIES ARE NOT PREPARED FOR POTENTIAL Y2K PROBLEM

WASHINGTON (EmergencyNet News) - The National Association of Counties said on Tuesday that about 50 percent of the United States' counties have no strategic plans to tackle millennium bug computer problems that could snarl everything from ambulances to railroad signal lights to drinking water supplies. Thegroup, which represents the nation's 3,069 counties, said only about half of the 500 counties it surveyed in November are ready for potentially disastrous computer snafus on 1 January 2000.

-- Linda (lwmb@psln.com), July 17, 1999.


Linda, big enough, especially if you live here! Durham, NC, 160,000 (home to Duke U and Medical Center and Research Triangle Park--HQ of many high-tech cos., IBM is here too), many more if you include urban sprawl in county--some services are joint, some overlap. Water and Sewer Dept. has been having severe problems too, big scandal. City Council a joke. Makes Louisiana politics look like a model of propriety and ethics. Not encouraging.

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), July 17, 1999.

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