State (Georgia): $378 million effort will beat Y2K bug, speed services
<< Georgia is spending three times more money than any other state in the Southeast not just to fix the Y2K problem, but to upgrade its aging state computer systems as well.
The state expects to spend $378 million on repairing the Y2K computer glitch, with 65 percent of that also going toward modernizing its information infrastructure, said W. Michael Hale, Georgia's chief information officer.
Other states have updated their equipment regularly. Tennessee, for example, is spending just $15.5 million to get its systems Y2K-ready because its oldest system is only 3 years old, Tennessee Chief Information Officer Bradley Dugger said.
Gov. Roy Barnes said at a forum on the state's Y2K initiative in January that Georgia's efforts amount to "rebuilding the very infrastructure of our information economy."
Many of the state's computer systems were developed in the 1970s and literally are antiques. "We started with an old architecture and that was unique to Georgia. The vendors [who installed the systems] weren't even able to fix the systems," Hale said. "That's why the price tag is so high." For example, more than 20,000 computers will be replaced statewide.
"We see the investments in Y2K as being a good foundation for state technology," Hale said.
Georgia has repaired about 83 percent of its Y2K problems so far , and even with the bulk of the work out of the way, the state is making sure it has the resources to handle any Y2K-related problems that may pop up. >>
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