I posted this earlier tonight. I imagine this story will make some of you feel better :)

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http://www.cbn.org/y2k/insights.asp?file=990121j.htm

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Superb Look At Grassroots Y2K Preparation Groups Sprouting Up Across America

http://www.pcworld.com/pcwtoday/article/0,1510,9433,00.html

(IDG-PC World)

For those of you who are preparing for Y2K (to whatever extent, and in whatever manner), and are tired of being labled as "survivalists" or "nuts," here's a good, well-written, intelligent story for you. It accurately portrays those who take Y2K seriously, and doesn't paint all of them as "millennialist nuts," religious fanatics, militia members, and so forth.

**The U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency issued an advisory on January 6 urging communities, emergency services agencies, and the public to prepare for possible problems from the Year 2000 computer glitch. But thousands of people across the country were hard at work well before FEMA offered advice.

**The effort appears orderly and calm but an underlying sense of urgency grows as the days tick by. Generally, groups encourage people to stockpile food, bottled water, medicines, medical supplies, and other necessities and to have cash on hand--the same sorts of preparations needed for an approaching hurricane or blizzard.

This next section will apparently come as quite a surprise to many members of the major media:

**Whatever the approach, the effort involves people from all walks of life. Some are high-tech professionals who are particularly able to help their communities because they know what efforts businesses and government are making to deal with Year 2000 problems. They also know what questions to ask officials...

**Based on interviews, e-mail exchanges, chat boards, and listserv postings on the Internet, it appears community organizers are persevering--despite what they perceive as indifference by government officials and neighbors, and media cynicism. They express hope that January 1, 2000, will come and go with scant problems. But they all seem to expect disruptions of varying severity. Some portend a time of tremendous upheaval.

These people don't believe the government has done the job:

**"A lot of people are in denial. They say that this can't be serious if the government doesn't think it's serious," she says...

**FEMA, which responds to disasters and is in charge of planning for the millennium bug, has not yet dealt with its own computer systems, and that jeopardizes the agency's credibility, Kaplan said.

And the story notes that the media have not always been fair to these people:

**Other organizers say the media has created problems by not taking the Year 2000 bug's possible effects seriously. Most news reports fall into a couple of camps, both of them hostile to grassroots preparedness efforts. Some reports convey dire, frightening consequences that leave readers thinking no amount of preparation will be enough. The others cynically dismiss concerns.

**Indeed, one grassroots organizer declined to speak to the IDG News Service, saying he has been "burned" too many times by the media when discussing the subject.

**A recent newsmagazine article included a graphic of Jesus returning to Earth at the millennium, amid people looking frightened. Then, "two-thirds of the way through (the story) they talk about what can be done. Why not reverse that," said H.A. "Red" Boucher, a community activist in Anchorage, Alaska. Boucher is a former mayor of Fairbanks, Alaska, state lieutenant governor, and representative, and now works to bring Internet connectivity to the largest and most remote state.

And the story concludes with reasons why preparation makes sense:

**Those pushing the grassroots effort have a growing sense that doing nothing in neighborhoods and communities also constitutes negligence. Some turmoil will result from the changeover to the Year 2000, they agree. Actually having a fixed date presents a unique opportunity to prepare.

**"There's no sense in waiting as people watch the clock roll around the world to see if London crashes before New York," Boucher says of what might happen on January 1, 2000. "That's stupid."

For those of you who have been persecuted or ignored by those who considered Y2K preparation foolish nonsense, here's a story to print out and pass on. It makes a lot more good points that I haven't excerpted here. It might give you some good ideas for your community.

-- Drew Parkhill/CBN News (y2k@cbn.org), January 21, 1999

Answers

Thank you very much, Drew. I know several people who will gratefully wolf this down and pick it apart to extract any useful ideas for their own community prep. Keep up your sharing spirit!

xxxxxxx xxxxxxx xxxxxx

-- Leska (allaha@earthlink.net), January 22, 1999.