City paying $500,000 a month for 2000 glitch that never materialized

CLEVELAND: Twenty months after the much-anticipated Y2K deadline passed, Cleveland is still paying $500,000 monthly for help against the computer glitch.

``The intent was not to give them a blank check,'' said City Council President Mike Polensek, a frequent critic of Mayor Michael White's administration.

``The council supported that because of what we were approaching and all the predictions of doom and gloom.''

Concerns heading into 2000 focused on the threat that the two-digit date systems read by computers would interpret the year '00 as 1900 instead of 2000, rendering information unusable.

In part due to extensive computer reprogramming, the Y2K glitch turned into a nonevent. In Cleveland, city government had no Y2K-related problems.

Nevertheless, White's administration has still been paying about $500,000 a month to two computer firms, The Plain Dealer reported yesterday. White declined to comment on the issue.

In 1997, White asked the council for permission to spend $6 million to safeguard city computers. The council, then led by White ally Jay Westbrook, approved a $2.6 million contract and in 1999 approved an additional $5.9 million deal.

In 1999, White used uncapped Y2K legislation approved earlier by the council to hire a consultant to train Finance Department employees how to use new software. The contract was approved by the Board of Control, which is composed of White and 12 of his cabinet members.

When billings exceeded the $256,000 contract limit, the contractor threatened to quit the project and the Finance Department approved an additional $135,000 payment.

In April, the Board of Control approved a $1.5 million contract for the contractor, and the administration bypassed the council by using the unlimited spending authority of the Y2K legislation, the newspaper said.

Ohio.com

-- Anonymous, September 03, 2001