AI Is on the Upswing in State Government

By Rachel Eckert, SLED Manager

When it comes to artificial intelligence, most states are just beginning to uncover its potential.

As I discussed in a recent webinar, AI usage thus far has been mostly experimental. Recent survey data from the Center for Digital Government demonstrates that nearly a third of those surveyed about their current deployment of AI are doing so through proof-of-concept projects.

While widespread use of AI is not taking place, the good news is that the share of states NOT using AI is only 12% — meaning there are far more states open to using AI than not. This is a wide-open field with few standards or common threads from project to project and provides an opportunity for AI vendors to approach state and local governments with their technology.

Cybersecurity and Fraud Detection

If you are approaching a state or local government with an AI-based analytics project, you should know that over 75% of state and local entities in the survey expect the biggest impact to come in the areas of cybersecurity and fraud, waste and abuse. A great deal of staffing resources are spent combatting cybersecurity issues, usually retroactively unfortunately, or searching for instances of fraud, waste and abuse.

Transportation

We will see more and more transportation agencies deploy AI for traffic management and crash mitigation. Soon we will be able to communicate through our Alexa-based devices to report traffic congestion and crashes to 511 systems so resources can be deployed in real-time. Google assistants are already being used to assess arterial traffic footage to more accurately predict where congestion might occur so solutions can be identified quicker.

Moving Forward With AI

We are already experiencing a rapid proliferation of AI into our daily lives — and state and local governments will most certainly be contributing to that in the not-to-distant future. As states begin to recognize the potential of AI, this is the time for vendors to gain an early foothold and showcase their capabilities in pilot projects.

To learn more about this subject, check out our on-demand webinar, “Data Analytics Offers Big Opportunities in State & Local Governments.”

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