What Has Been Accomplished in Boulder County

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6. Youth from around the county are joining the efforts by becoming Certified Emergency Response Team members to help in all disasters, as well as assisting to weatherize the homes or trailers of elderly and low-income families.

Some wonderful things have happened here.

1. The City of Boulder has joined forces with our preparedness group by advocating with the university for free office space; holding a joint press conference to outline the 'community plan' for 1999; allowing us to use city stationery to convey information about Y2K meetings throughout Boulder County, city FYI line to convey information about Y2K meetings.

2. 'How To' meetings have been held throughout the county. (See the format description that follows.)

3. A town meeting was held on October 4 that included representatives from Public Service (utilities), US West (telephone), City of Boulder, Office of Emergency Management, The Cassandra Project, and Boulder Community Hospital. The meeting was attended by more than 400 people who applauded when Chief Stern of the OEM told people they needed to individually prepare and then prepare their neighborhoods. Somehow folks were waiting for permission to act. The biggest message sent by the citizens was 'I want the truth' not 'everything will be okay' or 'we are handling it.' Future town meetings will be held every other month.

4. A rhythm of meetings in each municipality is now in place, from orientation (what is Y2K), to a neighborhood congress (how to conduct meetings), to open meetings (task forces present information to community on food preparedness, companies selling products, and so forth), to community coordinator meetings (coordinators for each municipality get together to fill each other in on what is going on, support needed, and idea sharing).

5. We have cooperation from our daily newspaper as well as our weekly paper; not sensationalized stories but ones that will keep the community informed.

We are working with many others in Boulder County to create a more sustainable and selfreliant community with Y2K as the catalyst. We contiune to work to transform cynicism and fear into creative and effective action by taking care of one another and by reaching beyond personal differences in a spirit of compassion, respect, trust, and interdependence.

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