Agencies again get low grades for Y2K efforts

In the final grading period of 1998, Congress' Y2K watchdog again gave the federal government a "D" for its efforts to eliminate the millennium bug from government computers, even though the Office of Management and Budget reported that agencies are nearly two-thirds of the way toward completing renovations.

Rep. Steve Horn, R-Calif., chairman of the House Government Reform and Oversight Subcommittee on Government Management, Information and Technology, said the executive branch has not made enough progress since his previous quarterly report card to rise above a "D."

"The picture is a gloomy one," Horn said Monday. "Executive branch departments and agencies are responding too slowly in assessing and repairing their mission-critical systems, their telecommunications equipment, their embedded chip systems and their data exchanges. We estimate, at the current rate of progress, that nearly one third of the federal government's mission-critical systems will not be year 2000 compliant by the deadline established by the President of March 30, 1999."

As of September, agencies had reported to OMB that 50 percent of their computer systems were Y2K compliant. This month, agencies said 61 percent of their systems were compliant, according to Linda Ricci, director of communications at OMB.

"Our preliminary data suggests some very notable progress," Ricci said, noting that OMB would be scrutinizing agencies' Y2K progress reports for another two weeks. "Eight agencies have increased their performance, even by Mr. Horn's standards. We are encouraged by the progress we've seen."

Agencies are required to report to OMB quarterly on their Y2K progress. Each quarter, OMB releases a report assessing overall government progress. And each quarter, Horn assigns grades to each agency.

This quarter, Horn praised the Small Business Administration for being the first federal agency to report that all of its mission-critical systems are Y2K compliant. SBA has 42 such systems. The Social Security Administration is 99 percent finished with its renovations, while the National Science Foundation is 88 percent done.

At the other end of the spectrum, Horn chastised the Health and Human Services Department's Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA), which runs the Medicare program, for completing Y2K work on only seven of its more than 100 mission-critical systems. Horn also gave failing grades to the departments of Justice, State and Energy and the Agency for International Development.

Horn also criticized the Defense Department, which has 2,581 mission-critical systems, for moving too slowly.

"It goes without saying that there is zero tolerance for error when you are dealing with the defense of our nation," Horn said.

The scope of DoD's problem is particularly daunting considering the many embedded chips in equipment that must be tested. The Navy alone must test 470,000 embedded chip components in its equipment.

Horn's Grades for Agencies' Year 2000 Efforts
Nov. 23, 1998