Dear RN list, Sept. 18 It seems that many people have been inspired by the news from Arcata which Paul Cienfuegos sent us. Because of the high interest in that piece, I will send along another piece Paul sent us, with information on how to order some excellent-sounding videos from JusticeVision. The person who is behind JusticeVideo, Ralph Cole, thanks Pacifica stations for their support. The item below includes a transcript of a documentary on community preparedness for Y2K from Pacifica Network News. all the best, Jan Date: Thu, 17 Sep 1998 21:48:29 -0300 To: •••@••.••• From: David Cameron/Nancy Sherwood <•••@••.•••> Subject: Re: exciting news from Arcata, CA Dear Jan, the Arcata piece was brilliant! here is another California piece from Mike Gurstein in Cape Breton(& now i know that i am a "y2k community organizer". Identity-crisis over!): DavidC Pacifica Network News September 4, 1998 Phillip Babich phone: (510) 251-1501 pager: (510) 330-7006 ANCHOR LEAD: As the year 2000 approaches many institutions are making preparations for the computer millennium bug known as Y2K. Programmers are scanning through millions of lines of code to correct a decades-old practice of indicating calendar years with 2 digits rather than 4. As it stands now, when 1999 rolls over into the year 2000 some computers will think it's 1900 or will simply crash. Microprocessors in appliances, cars and other machinery are also susceptible to Y2K. Meanwhile, community organizers across the United States are leaving nothing to chance, predicting the possibility of wide-spread social collapse as power grids go off line and the monetary system freezes up. But looking beyond mere survival tactics, these organizers see the millennium bug as an opportunity to promote a more sustainable vision for the future. Phillip Babich reports. 00.00 AMBIANCE 1 [SOUND FROM MEETING. Coordinator asks: "How many think Y2K is no big deal and it will be handled? How many don't know what really will happen...] 00.10 FADE TO BED AMBIANCE 1 00.11 NARRATION 1 (00.44) It's lunch hour and about three dozen people are gathered inside of a community art gallery in Berkeley, sharing ideas about what do when and if the Y2K computer bug strikes. They're not alone. Across the country -- from Oregon and California to Massachusetts and Florida -- more and more groups are meeting to discuss Y2K. Some tackle nuts-and-bolts survival issues: how to store water, what dried food to buy. Others have more of a visionary bent, looking at Y2K and its potential for disrupting the systems on which we've all come to rely as a defining moment for transforming society. Mary Ann Gallagher had been working in Silicon Valley as a computer design manager for ten years. In February she quit because she realized that Y2K was going to be a big problem -- an earthquake as she puts its -- and dedicated all of her time to community preparedness. 00.55 GALLAGHER 1 (00.20) ["Most people think in Silicon Valley that it's going to be a speed bump, don't worry about it. It seems to be cities like Boulder and Berkeley and 88 others that have serious groups considering what may be the alternatives if the infrastructure goes down and we need to draw together as communities."] 01.15 NARRATION 2 (00.38) If food distribution, financial, and telecommunications systems are down -- as some experts predict -- how can neighborhoods not only cope but create their own exchange systems that will be insulated from future macro-failures? Among the critical areas community organizers are most concerned about losing in the event of cataclysmic failure are electrical power and water. In the San Francisco Bay Area the region's main power supplier, Pacific Gas and Electric, has been working on the Y2K problem since 1995. According to spokesperson, Dianna Gapuz, P.G. and E. is on schedule for making its computer and power distribution systems Y2K ready. 01.53 GAPUZ 1 (00.32) ["We expect to complete remediation of the critical software systems here at P.G. and E. by the end of 1998 and we expect to complete testing of those systems by the third quarter of 1999. We just recently completed our inventory of embedded systems and our schedule calls for the completion of assessment of all critical embedded systems and repairing and replacing those by the fourth quarter of next year."] 02.25 NARRATION 3 (00.10) As for water...the East Bay Municipal Utilities District is predicting minimal Y2K impact. Spokesperson Charles Hardy says that water should keep flowing to homes and business in the new millennium. 02.35 HARDY 1 (00.18) ["A lot of testing is going on and has been going on for months and I guess that's one reason why I speak with some confidence that we feel that it's working in all the reports we're getting back from all the various groups and work groups that have been assigned to it. Either we have everything in hand or it's close to being there."] 02.53 NARRATION 4 (00.38) Nonetheless, some neighborhoods are bracing themselves for the worst. Despite a utility company's best efforts Y2K could get them anyway, according to some Y2K observers. Virtually every system is dependent on another system, whether its electricity, telecommunications or agri-business. According to some Y2K analysts, if any link within those systems fails there could be widespread effects. In light of this, people like Gallagher are operating on the assumption that "something" will happen when the year 2000 hits and that no one knows exactly what that "something" is. Lois Jones, a former planner for the City of Berkeley, says preparing for Y2K opens the door for alternative economic models. 03.31 JONES 1 (00.22) ["I think that the Y2K is one excellent opportunity for us to be looking beyond the year 2000 to create more sustainable local economies and more sustainable local business practices and neighborhood groups. The more that we treated it as an opportunity the better prepared we're going to be."] 03.53 NARRATION 5 (00.25) One way to promote local economies, say some organizers, is to institute a local currency system. There are already several models in place in the United States. The most notable is in Ithaca, New York, where over $50,000 worth of "Ithaca Hours" are in circulation.. Neighborhood activist Lawrence Schectman is working on a local currency and barter system in Berkeley. Participants in the program could exchange work or material goods using printed currency or an accounting method. 04.18 SCHECTMAN 1 (00.33) ["It's the idea to decentralize your currency down to the city level. What I've discovered is that decentralizing to the city level is, in fact, not decentralized enough. You have to decentralize to the neighborhoods because in order for people to ask each other for favors or to interchange with each other they have to know each other; they have to trust each other. A skill inventory and a local currency is very useful to get people who are already in contact with each other that much closer and that much more useful for each other."] 04.51 NARRATION 6 (00.28) Other possibilities include breaking from the power grid and building alternative energy sources such as solar plants. Although this sounds like a massive undertaking, Tom Atlee of the Co-Intelligence Institute in Oakland, California, says if resources were dedicated to such a task experts believe it could be completed. Atlee, who is working with groups across the country to prepare for Y2K, also says that cities could establish farms and gardens that would produce enough food for the population. 05.19 ATLEE 1 (00.26) ["Experts in bio-intensive agriculture and urban gardening say that if we were to really pull up our boot straps and go for it we could, in fact, create an entirely alternative agriculture system within cities and towns where people were growing the food that they needed locally and that that would be possible in the next year and a half if we really focussed on it."] 05.45 NARRATION 7 (00.15) Cynthia Beal in Eugene, Oregon, has already started on turning this goal into a reality. For years Beal has been running the Red Barn Natural Grocery and supporting sustainable agriculture. Now, Y2K has given her greater incentive to increase her food production. 06.00 BEAL 1 (00.34) ["I've been farming and learning what that's like, and building a relationship with several wonderful farmers and gardeners. We've opened up and are getting going a cookery inside the store that is geared to making more of the foods that are normally processed so that when the demand comes it will be something that we can service if there's an interruption. And if there's not an interruption then we'll simply be a healthy food manufacturer."] 06.53 NARRATION 8 (00.19) Beal's what-have-we-got-to-lose attitude seems to be a common denominator among Y2K community organizers. If nothing else, they say, at least by preparing for the millennium bug you'll get to know your neighbors. Or, as one organizer put it: "You don't think your house is going to burn down, but you still by home insurance." For Pacifica Network News, I'm Phillip Babich in Berkeley. -- Phillip Babich phone: (510) 251-1501 Managing Producer fax: (510) 251-1342 National Radio Project •••@••.••• 1714 Franklin St. Box #100-251 www.igc.org/MakingContact Oakland, CA 94612 EarthSea Box 95 Riverport NS Canada BOJ 2WO 902 766 4129