A coalition started by the city last year that began with about 50 public entities across the country has now swelled into the hundreds as local, state and even federal agencies embrace nontraditional ways for the government to better serve its constituents and spur progress through collaboration.
“Our goal is to create a government that moves faster, changes to meet evolving needs in our society, experiments and innovates the kind of government people deserve,” San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan said of the GovAI Coalition. “This isn’t a one-time change or a tool to put governance on autopilot. It’s about creating a culture of experimentation and continuous improvement. It’s about putting in the hard work to tackle old problems with new solutions, and it’s about not being afraid to break from traditional approaches, especially when they clearly aren’t working.”
Unlike the private sector, which faces market competition, the coalition sought to leverage how public sector employees can share strategies and tools to accelerate the adoption of new technology solutions.
San Jose CIO Khaled Tawfik said the group — which has developed uniform best practices, policies and manuals — shares all of its information, from instructions to templates, weekly with different jurisdictions. They also share test cases for ways they are testing or have implemented tools to solve problems.
Interest from government agencies and tech vendors was on full display this past week as the San Jose McEnery Convention Center played host to the coalition’s first GovAI Summit. More than 200 public entities and vendors spoke about their work, and ways they can collaborate in the future to improve service delivery.
“We know we eventually want to go international because we’re getting a lot of demand from cities all over the world,” Tawfik said. “We want to get more into the transaction for pilots, where we can collaborate in actual implementation and useful solutions that can be used nationwide. We’re looking forward to seeing how we can transition all the great work and momentum into the actual delivery of services. Whether you’re a big city or a small city, you’ll be able to copy and paste.”
Mahan highlighted several test cases from cities nationwide that caught his eye.
In Pittsburgh, the city is using AI to monitor its tree canopies, identifying areas to plant or trim trees and finding where they have become dangerous and may require removal.
Meanwhile, in Belleville, a small township in New Jersey, the local government has used AI to automate parts of its grant-writing and procurement processes, improving its efficiency.
He was also intrigued by Virginia Beach’s use of AI to monitor waterways in real time and predict floods and the potential need for street closures.
Over the past few years, San Jose has implemented several AI pilot programs and solutions itself.
Currently, the city is also testing out a bus route optimization tool that would prioritize bus routes at intersections, decreasing the time spent at red lights and keeping public transit on schedule.
San Jose has also used AI to improve language translation on government web pages and proactively identify potholes, graffiti, illegal dumping and homeless encampments so that it can deliver services before receiving a service request.
“You shouldn’t have to damage your vehicle by driving through the pothole,” Mahan said. “We should proactively sense it when it is emerging and fill it before it does any damage and somebody has to report it.”
The city has also partnered with San Jose State, which has taken on a leading role in training programs, to open a digital humanities center at the MLK Library.
“This collaboration showcases our shared commitment, how we’re leveraging technology and each other’s talents … the real world application, empowering our city staff to enhance the public services and address community needs,” San Jose State University President Cynthia Teniente-Matson said. “We are looking at this pilot initiative to integrate AI into all of our everyday tasks and what better place than in our public library that is very easily accessible in downtown San Jose.”
Last week, the city approved another pilot program to model and predict traffic impacts from construction and significant events.
The one tool Mahan hopes to see the city experiment on and implement is to improve the city’s permitting process, which continues to experience complaints over delays.
Mahan stressed that AI is not meant to replace the workforce, but rather free staff to work on other items to make government better.
He said part of his push when he became mayor was for the city government to think about new approaches to problem-solving and embrace innovation so long as there were some data privacy and security guardrails or safeguards in place.
“One of the things that is so important to the culture of Silicon Valley is the recognition that failure is OK if it leads to learning and improves hypotheses and allows the next iteration, the next approach to something, to be closer to the mark,” Mahan said. “We haven’t had that culture in government historically, and that’s part of what I wanted to bring into the government.”
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