This paper deals with how bills in the state of California become laws, otherwise known as the Legislative Process. It will trace the process of a bill from the inception of an idea, to the outcome on a particular bill. Since I am majoring in Electronics Technology, Computer Repair here at American River College, I have chosen a bill related to that field. This bill is Assembly Bill 1710, Liability, and computer failures. The failure being referred to deals with "year 2000" date change problem, or Y2K as it has been come to known.

The Y2K problem is that of information processing using the incorrect date as a parameter. In order to save on hard disk space and the size (number of bytes or kilobytes) of software, it was decided to only refer to the YEAR part of the date without the '19'. Therefore, the date would read as follows: dd/mm/yy (e.g. 02/12/98).

On the turn of the century the date parameter will read as follows: 03/01/00 and the software will misinterpret it as the 3rd of January 1900 and not 2000. This style of programming was adapted and has been used for the past 30 years and up until now. Most financial software purchased by financial institution

Senator Bruce McPherson (R-Santa Cruz) and Assemblymember Jim Cunneen (R-San Jose) co-authored the measure with Firestone. (Senator McPherson introduced a similar measure in the Senate, S.B. 2000, Information systems: public entity liability).

9. The California Chamber of Commerce--California's computer industry is critically important to our state's economy. This problem, commonly known as Y2K, must be addressed through informing users of their options with regard to computer failures. This bill will give California high-tech business, and those that use these systems for their own businesses, some predictability as to their liability regarding Y2K.

s was developed using the Cobol (Common Business Oriented Language) with the date parameter used incorrectly or only applicable in the 20th century (using the last two digits of the year). This makes most of the world's financial software inadequate and incorrect for the new millenium.

California Assemblymember Brooks Firestone (R-Los Olivos) introduced legislation to curtail the damages available in lawsuits against businesses. The measure, AB 1710, limits the damages available in Y2K litigation to the costs resulting from bodily injury, if any, and to the amount necessary to repair or replace the failed computer system or program. In other words, the measure would prohibit punitive damage awards or awards based on "emotional distress."

As a result, any programming that is not corrected properly by the year 2000 will stop functioning. This will have far reaching consequences as vital state and local services are interrupted, and individuals will be hurt either physically or financially. A major concern at the state government level is that government agencies will be hit by lawsuits from citizens seeking damages.

Some common words found in the essay are:
Dean Morehous, Governor Governor, R-Los Olivos, Information Technology, Judiciary April, Association AIA--AB, Y2K Y2K, California PIF--This, Oriented Language, Attorneys California-This, ab 1710, brooks firestone, date parameter, computer failures, bill returned, senator bruce mcpherson, web site, computer systems, damages available, information technology, punitive damages, analysis al hernandez, hernandez santana 1, hearing ayes 6, legislative analysis al,
Approximate Word count = 2656
Approximate Pages = 11 (250 words per page double spaced)