INDUSTRY-BY-INDUSTRY OUTLOOK : The Year in Preview

California came several years late to the nation’s economic recovery party, but the state should be celebrating all through 1997.

Here is what key industries will be up to:

TELECOMMUNICATIONS: Although Congress passed a landmark telecommunications reform law last winter, the industry will remain in turmoil until the federal courts speak. Several Baby Bells have filed suit challenging new Federal Communications Commission rules that set prices and other terms of service for local phone competition. The lawsuits have not halted reform: Many phone companies, such as Pacific Bell, are negotiating agreements with rivals such as MCI and AT&T; pending the outcome of the suits. Those efforts, along with the spread of new wireless forms of telephone service, promise to pave the way for widespread telephone competition to begin next year in Los Angeles and many other major metropolitan areas.