At South Australia’s City of Port Adelaide Enfield, the Y2K problem is seen as essentially a business issue not just an IT issue.
Y2K Project Manager, Martin Barbary, said while many Councils are heavily reliant on IT systems, these are relatively easy to manage.
“If they give way, we have safeguards and checks and balances in place to correct them,” he said.
“It is areas which use computer controlled processes such as traffic lights or swimming pool chlorination systems, which must be examined critically.
“It is basically a huge risk management issue. Even if you are very sure something will work, if it is a critical area any undetected problem could be devastating. Priority must be accorded to potentially life threatening areas.
“If rates do not go out for an extra day or even a week it does not matter, but if a failed air conditioning system leads to stocks of vaccines becoming contaminated, it does.”
Martin said testing systems to date has revealed a number of areas where difficulties could emerge.
“For example, we found storm water pumps set to the Year 2000 triggered automatically though there was no rain,” he said.
“Running unnecessarily could burn out motors and disable pumps in the event of a storm.”
He said rural Councils often face different issues than city Councils. A number of rural Councils run small airports and have responsibility for water supply and sewerage. All these areas must be examined for Y2K compliance.
Martin Barbary warned it is important to check assurances from suppliers as to their compliance.
“We found a number of products which we were assured were Y2K compliant failed our testing,” he said.
“Of greater importance is to be mindful that this is not a static area. Circumstances change.
“Some applications we had certified as compliant became noncompliant when manufacturers claimed altered circumstances had voided their guarantee. So it is important to maintain vigilance.”
Martin also said Councils should test for failures which may occur on 9 September.
“We identified a number of issues with this which we have corrected,” he said.
For further information contact Martin Barbary, telephone (08) 8405 6600.
