...the Y2K status of our water, electric, and gas, etc.?

-- Jack (This@isa.test), October 27, 1999

Answers

How many sites in our city handle hazardous chemicals? Have the emergency departments of our hospitals been informed which chemicals are present?

Has anyone checked into the contingency plans of nursing homes and assisted living facilities? Are they planning to send patients to the hospitals in the event of a power failure? If so, do the hospitals know?

How many warming shelters have been arranged? Will their location be announced in advance? How many people will they hold? Will food and water be available at them? If so, for how many people, for how long?

Are the traffic signals compliant?

Is the 911 system compliant?

What radio stations will broadcast emergency news? Do they all have generators and backup fuel?

Does the fire department have contingency plans for fighting fires if a prolonged power outage (say, 3 days or more) renders the water system inoperable?

Does any city agency have a list of people who are on electrically dependent life-support systems at home? If so, what plans have been made to assist them in the event of a power failure?

Do the police, fire, and other emergency response departments have an alternative means of communication if the phone lines are down?

Are there plans to place emergency and city workers strategically throughout the city to summon help and render aid in the event that phones are down?

-- Faith Weaver (suzsolutions@yahoo.com), October 27, 1999.

To quote Mr. Burns from "The Simpsons"...excellent!

-- Jack (This@isa.test), October 27, 1999.

Faith;

Have you asked those questions and got good answers?

I went to initial local council meeting to hear canned presentations with happy smiley faces and gave up on getting any real info.

-- Bill P (porterwn@one.net), October 27, 1999.

Where will the mayor, chief of police, fire chief, etc. be spending the rollover? How is that location heated? Has the heating system been Y2K checked? Communications systems?

Where are the emergency shelters? How will they be staffed? Heated? Has the heating been Y2K checked? How many days food supply is stored there?

What are the best routes out of town?

-- Mad Monk (madmonk@hawaiian.net), October 27, 1999.

1) Are you prepared to GUARANTEE, unequivocally, no one will die as a direct result of Y2K induced problems? If not then.....

2) Why... OH GOD WHY... didn't you warn us earlier, so more could have prepared?

3) How can you live with yourselves, knowing that your past silence, will now, no doubt kill many?

4) When you walk or drive about, do you feel empathy for the unfortunate victims of you policies? How about sympathy, pity, RESPONSIBILITY!!!

5) How many of the elderly, children, medically dependent, etc. are within the parameters of your "Acceptable Losses" contingency plans?

6) Will you forfeit your stat(e)us quo mentality, to help pick up the pieces? How will you do this? Give us an example.

Pardon me for a moment Jack, I must go compose myself for a bit. I'm experiencing a plethora of emotions just now.

Respectfully: Michael

-- Michael (mikeymac@uswest.net), October 28, 1999.

1) Are you confident that all utilities will be delivered in 2000 as they were in 1999. 2) Will you put, in writing, a guarantee to us that our utilities will not fail due to a y2k related problem? Why not. 3) Which answer are we to believe? Your answer to No. 1 or No. 2. Who can address this issue that will not give us doublespeak?

-- enough is (enough@enough.com), October 28, 1999.

Jack, excellent advice offered above. Also, you may have seen where I posted Durham has set aside three days of fuel for the 911 generator and one day each for the firefighting and paramedic generators. You might ask them how many days of fuel they have for their emergency services generators. You might also ask if they plan to widely distribute (like in the December water bill or something) the non-emergency numbers for 911 services in case the heavily computerized consoles fail. Hand-held radios, if properly charged, will last for a number of hours--don't know how many--so in the event of fail-safes failing, communications can go on for a while. My hand-held scanner will go for about 9 hours on charge but it's not as sophisticated as the hand-helds used by emergency services--on the bright side, their batteries are much bigger.

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), October 28, 1999.