BY HUGH D. PALMER

Delta Business Journal

Citizens in the northern part of the Delta well remember the ice storm in 1994 when thousands were without power and other pleasantries of life for over two weeks. In light of these all too recent memories, we all wonder how the controversial Year 2000 bug or Y2K problem will affect our basic services. Delta residents may sleep a little easier knowing that our energy and communication providers are already getting prepared for the Year 2000 and the problems that could arise.

The Delta's leading cellular provider, Cellular South, is in fact looking forward to the Year 2000.

We have been planning to upgrade our system anyway, so the Y2K situation fits into our plan and just makes us work a little harder to get our system in order, said Craig Miller software development manager for Cellular South.

According to Miller, Cellular South will begin conducting Y2K tests on their system early next year.

Some big concerns are that even though we are getting everything in line we deal with a lot of external interfaces with banks, clearing houses, roaming partners, and others and we are in the process of having them certify to us that they are going to be Year 2000 compliant.

We have had contact with everyone that we interface with in some form or fashion to insure that they are going to be compliant as well, said Miller.

According to Entergy spokesman, Ed Bryson, the Y2K problem is one which Entergy also has been working on for some time.

ÒWe have a pretty elaborate Y2K project underway at Entergy right now, said Bryson. We have been working on the important things first and that is to be sure that the systems that control the way the electricity is managed to and from is at the top of the list.

Entergy is doing everything that we know to do in order to be prepared for this. It's impossible for anyone to precisely predict how all of this will play out when the year 2000 arrives, said Bryson. we're very confident that we'll have everything in place that should be in place. We anticipate that we will be finished testing and certifying all of our critical systems which are our electricity delivery systems by early next year.

This is an enormous project for a company the size of Entergy. For the domestic electric utility part of our company itÕs about a $90 million project which covers service to more than 2 million customers in four states, said Bryson.

Phil Hardwick, vice president for Community and Economic Development at Mississippi Valley Gas said that his company, like Entergy, has been working on the Y2K situation for some time and they are working with their vendors in order to help them come under compliance.

ÒWe are requiring that our primary software vendors certify that they are Year 2000 compliant and a lot of vendors that we deal with are requiring the same thing of us,Ó said Hardwick.

On Saturday, July 18, Mississippi Valley Gas conducted a Y2K test in order to determine what affect this would have on their system and according to Hardwick, the results of this test were very pleasing.

We are actually ahead of schedule in getting this problem solved, said Hardwick. We are where we want to be at this time and we don't anticipate any major problems with the Year 2000.Ó

BellSouth's area manager for the Delta, Carolyn Manning, says that like Entergy and Mississippi Valley Gas, BellSouth is well on the way to becoming Year 2000 compliant.

We have been working on this since 1995 and our goal is to have all conversions, unit tests, and system tests completed by December 31, 1998, said Manning. Our plan is to have this work completed well in advance so our customers will not have any problems with their phone service on January 1, 2000.

According to Manning, BellSouth expects to spend up to $200 million to make its systems compliant. This includes checking more than 3000 mainframe and midrange systems, 2,500 voice switches, and 30,000 desktop computers.

We feel very good about the work that we have done in order to prepare for the Year 2000, said Manning. DBJ

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