How San Diego is using AI — and what's next
Add Axios as your preferred source to
see more of our stories on Google.
Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios
City Hall is using AI for basic tasks like summarizing emails and meetings and generating slides, but also has bigger ideas for the future, according to officials and records reviewed by Axios.
The big picture: While many businesses grapple with how to use AI safely, government agencies are also factoring in the need to protect public information and maintain human oversight.
Follow the money: The city agreed to pay Planet Technologies $300,000 in 2024 to roll out Microsoft Copilot as a pilot AI use project, according to the contract obtained by Axios through a public records request.
- City employees are now using Copilot and Google Gemini in daily tasks like gathering questions from email threads, creating slide decks for council presentations and assigning tasks after meetings, city CIO Jonathan Behnke told Axios.
The city also trained Gemini, Azure and Amazon chat bots to analyze the city's intranet documents, Behnke said on the Urban AI YouTube series.
Meanwhile, they're exploring using AI for broader projects, including:
- Transcribing and analyzing council meetings so staff can easily see if their departments are mentioned
- Fulfilling public records requests and making redactions
- Answering calls on the police department's non-emergency line
State of play: The only AI technology that interacts with the public right now is the My eCISO project.
- An AI chatbot talks with small business owners and gathers information on their cybersecurity strategies and operations to give a report card on their security threat level.
- The city's AI policy requires a human to always be in the loop to check whatever AI is doing, Behnke told Axios.
What they're saying: As the city approaches this brave new world, officials should be transparent about AI use and ensure public data is protected, Ebrahim Tarshizi, director of the Applied Artificial Intelligence program at the University of San Diego, told Axios.
- "If I'm implementing any type of AI, and if one of my customers, which is my citizens, comes and asks me a question about how the AI works, there should be somebody in any organization to explain," he said.
- AI is a powerful tool that could make the city government more efficient, he said.
Case in point: Autonomous vehicles scanning city streets for potholes could be a potential use, he said.
Yes, but: AI can be risky if deployed without oversight, which means lots of training for the employees using it, he said.
- "It shouldn't be one workshop, but constantly training by online courses, or a monthly meeting," Tarshizi said.
Threat level: Tarshizi said city employees shouldn't be worried about being replaced by AI, even if they have a repetitive job that could be picked up by a computer.
- If there's a job that was done by five people, and thanks to AI only requires two people, the remaining three people "can be used at a higher level, and they can do more complex things," he said.