Feds Contingency Planning

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http://currents.net/newstoday/99/11/01/news1.html

Agencies Must Focus On Y2K By David McGuire, Newsbytes. November 01, 1999

Although federal agencies continue to make strong progress toward Y2K remediation, government Y2K planners must place more emphasis on developing and testing contingency and so-called "day-one" plans, a panel of experts said at a congressional hearing today.

Agencies that do not establish viable contingency plans "run the risk of an untrained response (to Y2K failures) that is more ad hoc in nature and (that) may be the wrong response," US General Accounting Office (GAO) Y2K expert Joel Willemssen said today.

Willemssen spoke at a hearing on contingency and day one planning held by the House Government Reform Committee's Subcommittee on Government Management, Information and Technology and the House Science Committee's Subcommittee on Technology.

Although most federal agencies have complied with an Office of Management and Budget (OMB) request to submit contingency and day one plans, many of those plans remain incomplete, according to today's witnesses.

Willemssen is also concerned that not all federal contingency and day- one plans have been tested. "Day-one plans should be reviewed and, if possible, rehearsed," Willemssen said.

Day-one plans are basically to-do lists for agencies to follow in the few days leading up to and following the date rollover. They set out a laundry list of actions aimed at assessing and addressing any Y2K- related glitches. Contingency plans are designed to be implemented only in the event of system failures.

OMB had sent an Oct. 15 deadline for agencies to submit contingency and day one plans, and with the exception of a handful of smaller agencies, all have complied with the deadline, OMB Administrator John Spotila said today. OMB has also asked agencies which provided incomplete information to submit updated plans as soon as possible.

Willemssen also raised concerns that most agencies have not reported how much it would cost to implement their contingency plans, but Spotila said that the OMB has been deliberately lenient in that area.

"The most important (consideration) for agencies should be getting their plans in place," he said.

Joining Willemssen and Spotila in testifying before today's hearing were Y2K planners from the Department of Defense, Internal Revenue Service, Social Security Administration, and a handful of other agencies. All outlined their contingency and day-one planning efforts.

A GAO report on federal day-one and contingency planning released at today's hearing also points out flaws and inadequacies in the reporting efforts of state-administered federal programs such as the Department of Agriculture's Food and Nutrition Service (food stamp) program and the Department of Labor's Unemployment Insurance Program.

-- Deb (vmcclell@columbus.rr.com), October 31, 1999


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