“Not one,” he says proudly.
Instead, he’s largely delegated that task to artificial intelligence — a technology he says everyone must rapidly adopt or risk being left behind.
“It touches everything we do, and it makes it all more efficient,” Briner, a Republican elected in 2024, told The News & Observer in an interview last week. “So why wouldn’t we?”
In pursuit of that goal, Briner has become the first agency head in North Carolina to publicly commit to implementing AI tools department-wide, purchasing over 200 custom licenses for his employees to the tune of roughly $113,000.
The new AI tools, which were purchased after a 12-week pilot program with OpenAI — the company that developed ChatGPT — will be used for coding, research, brainstorming and more throughout the department.
Briner said he is well aware of the concerns people have with AI, ranging from its tendency to hallucinate incorrect data, to fears of mass layoffs resulting from the technology replacing workers.
Last week, Fortune reported that new research from Goldman Sachs found that AI has led to roughly 16,000 net job losses per month.
Briner maintains that safety and privacy were built into the contracts the department has entered into with AI companies — and that internal training has emphasized the need for caution.
And layoffs, at least in his agency, are “not in the narrative right now,” he said, emphasizing that humans need to be “in the loop, to make sure that we’re not off course.”
But as to growing fears that workers could be training the technology that eventually takes their jobs — even if it is years from now — Briner emphasized the need for progress.
“That’s been a concern since the Luddites destroyed the mill machines,” he said, referring to the movement of 19th century textile workers who opposed the automation of their trade during the Industrial Revolution.
“Employment grows as a result of technology, but it certainly changes, too,” Briner continued. “Change is not easy for anyone. I know that, and so we’ve got to have a real change management effort around helping people see how their job is going to change for the better.”
When the treasurer’s department began its pilot program with OpenAI in March 2025, Briner said that about half of the staff were “essentially not willing” to use the technology.
“That number’s gotten smaller over time,” he said. “But it’s not zero.”
In a statement to The N&O, Ardis Watkins, executive director of the State Employees Association of North Carolina, said that her organization isn’t opposed to progress, but is wary of how AI may affect workers.
“Any adoption of AI tools must be transparent with employees, involve them in the process, and commit to protecting the workforce that makes these agencies function,” she said. “We’ll be advocating for our members every step of the way.”
The pilot program focused on two divisions whose work primarily involves public data, mitigating any concerns about private identifying information being fed into AI models.
Those divisions were state and local government finance, which oversees the fiscal health of municipalities, and unclaimed property, which returns uncashed checks, stocks, bonds or other funds to their rightful owners.
After training employees in these divisions to integrate ChatGPT into their workflow, they saw a 10% increase in productivity, Briner said — a metric measured by the time period required to complete routine tasks. He added that researchers from NC Central University validated that finding.
From there, Briner decided to implement the technology across virtually the entire department, a process which culminated with the purchase of 150 custom ChatGPT licenses in March — an addition to the existing 82 AI licenses the department already had with Microsoft and GitHub.
While the tools will intersect with most divisions, staffers who deal with more sensitive data — like the state’s health and retirement plans — will have less AI integration.
Briner stressed, however, that the AI models employees will use are contractually prohibited from training on the state’s data.
“We’ve spent a lot of time on the guardrails (and) on the training to ensure that we are not just following state policy, but exceeding state policy,” he said.
The national regulatory environment surrounding AI, however, is largely nonexistent.
The federal and North Carolina state governments have not adopted any significant regulations on AI, and President Donald Trump has attempted to preempt states from passing their own laws on the subject.
What are other state agencies doing?
State agencies may develop their own guidelines surrounding AI, but little information is available on that front.
In September 2025, The N&O requested detailed records from all of North Carolina’s state agencies about their usage of AI tools and any guidelines they had adopted for using the technology.
As of April 2026, the treasurer’s department, the Department of Public Instruction and the Department of Agriculture are the only agencies to supply records for that request. Some agencies, like the Department of Labor, said they did not have any records on the subject.
The main guidelines governing AI usage in North Carolina (other than those Briner has imposed himself) come from the state’s Department of Information Technology, which maintains a “Responsible Use of Artificial Intelligence Framework” that was last updated in August.
The 10-page document lays out a series of best practices, which include keeping the technology “human-centered,” respecting privacy and being transparent about AI usage.
Asked if a more comprehensive set of guardrails is needed, Briner replied that he’s “not a big believer in top-down regulation of innovation.”
“It never seems to work,” he said. “Innovation goes around the edges every time.”
From tech to treasurer
Embracing new technology is nothing new to Briner, who spent most of his career as an investment adviser prior to becoming treasurer.
In fact, he invested with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman back when he was the president of Y Combinator, a venture capital firm focused on technology startups.
Altman was recently the subject of a major investigation from the New Yorker, which included details about his contentious departure from YC in 2020.
“I’m going to choose my words carefully,” Briner said when asked about his relationship with Altman. “Sam’s departure from YC was not a great experience and that has colored my thinking about doing things with him in the future.”
“We’re not an investor in OpenAI,” he added. “But we certainly enjoy the product.”
As Briner’s department continues to become fully integrated with AI, he hopes his experiences will prompt other leaders in the state to follow suit.
On Monday afternoon, April 13, he was set to speak at an AI conference at UNC-Chapel Hill, where he planned to urge governments to move faster to adopt the technology.
The benefits, Briner said, outweigh the concerns.
“The only unambiguously good thing in economics is productivity growth,” he said. “It’s the solution to so many problems, right? It’s how societies get wealthier. It’s how people live better lives.
“This is that, staring us in the face.”
© 2026 Raleigh News & Observer. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
