Y2K fear: The city and RCMP are ready for. whatever happens come the new year\NEWS AS Trees for sale Terrace scouts sell Don Coburn’ S locally grown Christmas trees\COMMUNITY B1 Put ‘em up: Local boxer Joey Losier hopes to fight his way into the Olympic ring\SPORTS B11 WEDNESDAY December 22, 1999 Y2K nails North Pole THE Y2K bug has hit the North Pole, throwing the liny enclave into a tizzy wondering what will happen midnight Dec, 31. “What do I know about com- puter chips?” a vexed Santa said last week. “All 1 know about chips is the chocolate kind in the cookies the children leave me Christmas Eve.” The North Pole’s problems ’ surfaced last week with the re- lease of a consultant's report on the state of its computerized systems, Like most places, the Pole’s computers weren't YZK compli- ‘ant, leading to fears about what lay ahead. _mas Eve visits around the world won't be affected because they occur before Dec, 31, the con- sultant’s report found there was much wrong with the North Pole’s lack of progress in con- verting its computer systems to a ¥2K-friendly environment, The only item found to be in working order was Santa’s sleigh’s guidance system, oper- ated and maintained by Ru- dolph and the rest of the rein- deer. “We take our motto, ‘Rudolph with your nose so bright, won’t you guide my sleigh tonight”, very seriously,” said Rudolph. “Since June, NavCanada and other authori- ties.” “A test of our system was done in October and yes, my nose was red as per the specifi- cations,” he said. “We guaran- tee Santa will get to where he is going.” The consultants found elves Santa had delegated to repro- fram the computer’ systems well before year end didn’t buckle down to work on the chore until rather late. It appeared they banded .to- gether in the fall and entered the world of e-commerce with their own company, fays- byelves.cont. tive - the company’s shares soared 900 per cent in its first day of trading on the stock mar- ket ~ but the pointy-eared rosy- cheeked entrepreneurs are only now scrambling to do what they were supposed to do in the first place. At the heart of the North Pole computerized system are the lists — the vital documents recording who has been naughty and who has been nice over the past year. Having those fall victim to the Y2K bug with the chance they could be scrambled would be a disaster to the North Pole’s continuing operations. $1.00 PLUS 7¢ GST ($11.0 plus 8¢ GST outslde of the Terrace area) . VOL. 12 NO. 37. wrestles with computer chaos a system failure to be quite high,” the consultants — said. “Those who are naughty would end up with something meant for those wha are nice. And those who are nice would end up with something meant for somebody who was naughty ~ like season’s tickels (o the Ca- nucks or a copy of ‘Effective Budget Management.’ auto- graphed by the NDP caucus.” The consultants gave a nod to Santa’s personal prepared- ness fur Y2K. He may not know much about computers, but did have the foresight to lay in a year’s supply of milk and cook- ies should deliveries to the Although this year’s Christ- we've worked very closely with The sideline has been lucra- “We tank the probability of M@ Seasons greetings COLOURFUL ARTWORK: Clarence Michiel Ele- mentary School student Richard Anderson and his Grade 5 classmates’ festive holiday artwork festoon A SWEEPING series of public meetings are planned early next year as northwest- ern health cure officials grapple with de- veloping a better way to spend scarce health care dollars. Exact details are still being worked out, but there could be at least two meet- ings each in key towns across the north- west. The meetings are part of a massive, $200,000 effort on the part of local com- munily health councils to develop a more regional approach, “We need to have a plan. We simply can’t react to events. We need to walk the walk,” said Tony Briglio, the chair of the North Coast Community Health Council in Prince Rupert who is the main contact with the Alberta company hired to do the work. The work will be directed by a 20- member committee made up of represen- tatives of area health councils and health professionals, Also on the commitice will be the Northwest Community Health Services Society, formerly the Skeena Health Unit. “Consultants will only act on the di- rection of the steering committee,” said local health care official Tom Novak said. “The consultants were hired to do the leg work to bring information to the committee.” It’s the steering commiltee’s job to make the final decisions, goals, actions and timelines for completion, he added. Western Health Planning Associates Ltd., the consultants tired to heip draft the regional plan has extensive experi- ence in combining smaller rural health care authorities in Alberta. AN 18-year-old Terrace man remains in custody aflerap- be North Pole be disrupted. Santa Claus Big push on for a regional plan Health bodies to meet across the northwest That province went through a massive shake up in health care in the 1990s when administrative structures were merged, some facilities closed and costs reduced by wage cuts and layoffs. Briglio from Prince Rupert said the intent of a northwestern plan is'a docu- ment that has merit and credibility by in- volving as many people and groups as possible, “] want to see a real push on this,” he said. “I’ve seen too many attempts in the 17 years [’'ve been involved in health is- sues po nowhere,” Ten northwest health care authorities from Smithers to the Queen Charlotte Is- lands are sharing the cost of the plan. They’ve struggled for several years to develop a more regional approach to health planning and expenditures. The situation grew serious this year when nursing shortages at Mills Memorial Hospital caused it to limit admissions. That resulted in local doctors saying they wouldn’t admit patients from outside Terrace so that nurses wouldn’t be placed under heavy workloads. There’s also becn a growing demand for the development of more regional spe- cially medical services. This, in turn, has some community health care officials worried as they fear they’! be a centralization of such servic- es in Terrace with other communities on the losing side. Briglio did say that spending $200,000 ona sludy may scem like a lot of money, but added it was necessary to have a document agreeable to as many people as possible in the northwest. Arrest of 18-year-old ends year-long murder probe The man — who cannot identified under the race airport. An arrest team of plain- clothes and uniformed the halls of his school. Children in the school district turn their artistic talents toward the imagery of the season at this time of the year. pearing in court Monday charged with first-degree murder for the Dec. 9, 1998 killing of lacal woman Lin- da Lefranc. Young Offenders Act be- cause he was 17 when Le- frane was killed - was ar- rested Friday night returning from Vancouver at the Ter- RCMP olficers made the ar- rest at 7:55 pam. in the air- port terminal. The man was Continued Page A2 Banks have extra cash for any Y2K worries BANK VAULTS are full with more. than the usual amount of cash in preparation for any panic over the Year 2000 changeover. Local bankers say they've made contingency plans to cover any possibility and maintain con- sumer confidence in the banking system. “We will have sufficient cash on hand — no question about it,” says Royal Bank branch man- ager Dave Wilson. It conjures up images of a convoy of armoured cars heading north, but in fact cash flow at this time of year usually runs in the other direction. Christmas means merchants deposit ‘large’ amounts of cash banks then have to send away. This year, says Wilson, the Royal is holding onto more of it to build up a supply of cash to meet demand. “All banks including us are build- ing up some teserves,” he said. Just as important are steps being taken to make sure people can access their money. Earlier this month the Royal stopped putting $5 bills in its automated teller machines (ATMs) and is now using all $20 bills, That means the cash value each machine can dispense is consid- erably higher without. being replenished. “If there’s a run there's more in cach ma- chine, there's increased capacity,” Wilson said. “We'll go back to the old system In mid- . Jamiary.” ‘The worst tase scenario — a power outage or data line failure that would knock out ATMs -- would prompt the bank to open for cash withdra- wals on the Monday after the holiday weekend, a day the bank would normally be shut. They’ve also got more than the usual number of forms for bank drafts, money orders and travel- lers cheques for people who want to make large withdrawals, “We don’t really recommend people carry a lot of cash around,” he said. So far, Wilson said, local banks haven’t seen cuslomers come in and empty their accounts. “We haven't seen any. of it,” he said. “Most people seem to feel it’s'a non-event from our dis- cussions with clients.” Terrace and District Credit Union manager Valerie Gauvin said members there are also re- laxed, “People seem to be at ease,” she said. “We're not concerned at all with any run for cash.” Some people have been moving money out of equity mutual funds in case of stock market vo- latility, she noted. The credit union is offering travellers’ cheques for free to members who want to take out extra money, she said, adding that way they're -protec- ‘ted if thieves break i in. ~“We. don’t want members to have a bunch of cash in their homes,” she said.