ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE [AI] IS NOT USED, IN WHOLE OR IN PART, IN PREPARING NYPPL SUMMARIES OF JUDICIAL AND QUASI-JUDICIAL DECISIONS

June 16, 2024

Selected links to items concerning government operations posted on the Internet during the week ending June 14, 2024

 

AccuWeather Data Used to Measure Children’s Health Risks Researchers from Children’s Hospital Los Angeles and USC are working with AccuWeather experts to use environmental data to look for breakthroughs in diseases like stroke, heart disease, lung cancer and asthma. READ MORE

 

AI-Generated Candidate Files to Run for Office in Wyoming An AI-generated candidate has filed to run for Cheyenne mayor, and county officials are investigating whether VIC, an acronym for Virtual Integrated Citizen, can appear on the ballot. READ MORE

 

Arizona AG Investigates Governor After ‘Pay to Play’ Accusation Attorney General Kris Mayes has opened an investigation regarding the payment Gov. Katie Hobbs received from a residential homes company after the state increased funding for the organization. READ MORE

 

Arizona Lawmakers Bypass Hobbs’ Vetoes, Send Measures to Ballot One resolution would eliminate most judicial re-elections, essentially giving judges lifetime appointments. READ MORE

 

Best Practices For Strengthening Mobility and Connectivity With a Public-private Approach For agencies focused on service delivery, getting the right connectivity approach in place is essential to meet current and future demands of public service. LEARN MORE [CONTENT PROVIDED BY T-MOBILE FOR GOVERNMENT®]

 

Broward County Enlists Drones to Help Keep Mosquitoes at Bay The Florida county has begun using a drone to spray hard-to-reach areas to control mosquito populations more efficiently. Already in 2024, there have been seven cases of locally- acquired dengue virus. READ MORE

 

California Bill Would Fund Sober Housing, Suggesting New Approach  Proposed legislation would allow for up to one-quarter of the state’s spending on homeless housing, assistance and prevention programs to go toward sober living environments. The bill would reverse a 2016 funding ban. READ MORE 

 

Can L.A. Be Doing More for the Kids Living on Skid Row? More than 200 children live on Skid Row, a majority of which stay in the only homeless shelter in the neighborhood that allows families. Advocates are urging the city to do more to help. READ MORE

 

Cruise AVs Hit the Road in Houston With Drivers, at First After previously resuming operations in Dallas, the company’s autonomous cars will resume operations in Houston this week. Plans are to shift to autonomous driving with a driver present sometime in coming weeks. READ MORE

 

Cybersecurity, Deepfakes and the Human Risk of AI Fraud AI-generated cyber attacks and deepfakes mean new risks and new ways to fight them. "Human risk management" is a term to describe how organizations train their staff to detect these evolving threats. READ MORE

 

Detroit Autonomous Delivery Pilot Will Begin With Food Waste The Autonomous Robotic Pickup Platform, a project launching next week in Detroit’s Transportation Innovation Zone, will start by testing small sidewalk delivery bots to collect food waste for compost. READ MORE

 

Do Political Infighting and Misleading Mailers Impact Voters? Friction within the South Carolina Republican Party has led to hordes of aggressive and accusatory campaign materials being sent out to voters. Candidates will now see if their tactics pay off as residents go to the polls for the June 11 primary. READ MORE


Employees Want AI at Work - Are You Ready? AI not only helps employees to work faster, but also to work smarter. How can you use AI to empower your workforce? READ THE 2024 WORK TREND INDEX ANNUAL REPORT [CONTENT PROVIDED BY MICROSOFT]

 

Enhance Public Sector Services with Generative AI Discover how AI can enhance productivity and accelerate discovery in your public sector organization in this hour-long module. START THE LEARNING PATH  [CONTENT PROVIDED BY MICROSOFT]

 

Findlay, Ohio, Schools Adopt ‘Time Gap’ System for Emergencies Findlay Schools are equipped with a biometric system that sounds alarms and notifies the appropriate people of an incident and the location of where a disturbance is happening, saving critical time. READ MORE

 

Florida Will Finally Clean Up Its Hazardous Waste Dump With $62M Plan The Petroleum Products Corporation Superfund site in Pembroke Park acted as a dumping ground for an oil-processing and refining facility from 1957 to 1971. Now it’s one of the nation’s worst hazardous waste dumps. READ MORE

 

Hawaii Bill Would Have CIO Report to State Comptroller Legislation awaiting Gov. Josh Green’s signature would have the state chief information officer no longer report directly to the governor. Critics say this could diminish the role and have a chilling effect on innovation. READ MORE

 

How Email Scammers Hit Arlington, Mass., Covered Their Tracks Cyber criminals diverted four monthly payments meant for a vendor involved with rebuilding the town’s high school, and they carefully managed compromised employee email accounts to hide the fraud. READ MORE

 

How Oklahoma Is Training Its Workforce to Leverage AI The state, working with Google, has launched a course providing foundational AI skills training to residents. The offering, open to 10,000 people at a time, is designed to create an agile workforce. READ MORE

 

How the National Guard prepares for 'Zero-Coverage' Emergencies This white paper explains how the National Guard has incorporated advanced networking and communications tools to prepare military organizations for 'zero-coverage' emergencies. DOWNLOAD

 

Hurricanes Don’t Stop at the Coast Storms that have devastated mountain communities and other inland regions are a reminder to prepare. New development in areas that were once thought unlikely to flood may be more susceptible as the climate heats up. READ MORE

 

Infrastructure Requires Money. Tolls Are the Way. Two of the best alternatives for user-paid infrastructure are toll roads and variable-fee express lanes. States with fast-growing populations are embracing toll projects because they can't wait for federal funding, and private capital is eager to invest. READ MORE

 

Investigation Underway After Cleveland ‘Cyber Incident’ City Hall and the Ohio city’s offices at Erieview Tower were closed for a second day on Tuesday, but officials have released few details on what may have occurred. The incident came to light via normal operations of city IT, a spokeswoman said. READ MORE

 

Keep Your First Responders In-The Know: Tools for Dependable Communication The more first responders know about a situation, the better decisions they can make. This paper from Verizon offers practical guidance on the latest strategies and tools for keeping first responders connected. DOWNLOAD

 

Local Government Guide to Managing Grants This guide takes a deep dive into six significant barriers to successful grant management in local governments. It outlines best practices to address each and features insightful resources to help you implement solutions. DOWNLOAD

 

Maine Will Achieve Carbon Neutrality Before 2045 Goal The state Department of Environmental Protection announced that it is 91 percent of the way toward meeting its carbon neutrality target by 2045. But the state still has a way to go before reaching its other climate goals. READ MORE


Making the Most of AI: How Agencies Can Get Their Data Ready As government agencies consider the potential of new AI technology across the enterprise, they keep coming up against the same question: How do they prepare the data needed to deploy these solutions successfully? READ MORE

 

Minnesota’s Amber Alerts Have Near Perfect Record of Finding Children The state’s system for finding missing children was implemented in 2002. Since then, Minnesota has helped to recover all but one of the 46 children for which the state has sent out alerts, usually on the same day. READ MORE

 

N.Y. Congestion Pricing Reversal Hits Transit in the Wallet As ridership continues to lag amid a stubbornly slow recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, cities experiment with free rides and micromobility to prove public transit’s worth in worsening financial conditions. READ MORE

 

New Digital and IoT Solutions Are Transforming How Cities Connect and Adapt To navigate the complex web of government operations and unlock city-wide IoT benefits, departments and agencies need the right mix of coverage and capability. LEARN MORE [CONTENT PROVIDED BY T-MOBILE FOR GOVERNMENT® ]

 

New York State Governor's Hochul's Reversal on Congestion Pricing Draws Blowback Gov. Kathy Hochul’s decision to pull the plug on a congestion pricing plan for New York City was seen as a move calculated for advantage in the November elections, but it hasn't made her many new friends. READ MORE

 

Nonprofit Offers Free Cybersecurity Consulting to Public Sector The Center for Internet Security’s Cybersecurity Advisory Services Program is aimed at helping strengthen organizations that are involved in elections, health care, education and utilities. READ MORE

 

North Carolina Driver’s License Production Backlog Eases The issue required residents to wait as long as eight weeks for their licenses to arrive in the mail. That lag has been halved and is expected to disappear entirely by month’s end. The precise cause remains unclear. READ MORE

 

One State Is Putting a Single Person in Charge of Its Growth Strategy Michigan’s first-in-the-nation chief growth officer is working to refresh the state’s brand with help from partners whose survival depends on attracting more workers. READ MORE

 

Opinion: Teach Human Intelligence Before Artificial Intelligence Before students use AI tools to complete their work, they should first develop their own HI (human intelligence) and understand the purpose of education and the importance of ethical behavior and personal integrity. READ MORE

 

Popular Wildfire App Highlights the Radio Encryption Dilemma Watch Duty, a wildfire-tracking app manned by volunteers monitoring fire scanners, provides emergency information to the public. As the app expands, so does debate about fire department scanner traffic encryption. READ MORE

 

RapidSOS and Google Rolling Out RCS Tools for 911 Calls Thanks to Apple, rich communication services are in the news, and now a new partnership could help spread those tools deeper into the public safety space. RapidSOS is coming off a major funding round. READ MORE

 

San Diego Is Home to Nation’s Most Polluted Beach The Surfrider Foundation found that of the nation’s 10 most polluted beaches, three are in California. San Diego’s Imperial Beach held the top spot, with every water sample failing the state’s health standards. READ MORE


Security Operations Center: The Key to Growing Your Agency's Cyber Maturity Over 3,000 U.S. government organizations cite top cybersecurity concerns. Learn how a managed SOC can help. DOWNLOAD

 

Set Targets, Determine KPIs, and Share Progress If you’re working on–and struggling with–setting your organization’s wildly important goals, you’re not alone. Goal setting can be hard. How do you ensure goals are motivating and not overwhelming? Download our eBook to learn best practices for setting goals that motivate teams and leave an impact. DOWNLOAD eBOOK [CONTENT PROVIDED BY OPENGOV]

 

Skills-Based Hiring Is Hot, but Dropping Degree Requirements Is Just the First Step Governments and private employers are beginning to reap the benefits of this move, but sweeping changes in state and federal policy and adoption of new technologies are needed to make good on its promise. READ MORE

 

Social Security Can’t Be Fixed? State Policymakers Might Know Better. Since the Great Recession, states have moved to reform their public pension plans, making tough choices and frequently doing so with bipartisan support. Federal lawmakers should keep these lessons in mind. READ MORE

 

Solar Impact: Harness the Sun to Power Your Mission Onsite solar panel installations by local governments can cut costs, enhance sustainability, and tap into federal funds. LEARN MORE NOW [CONTENT PROVIDED BY SCHNEIDER ELECTRIC]

 

Some Lawmakers Seek to Address Existential Threats of AI A handful of lawmakers say they plan to press the issue of the threat to humans posed by generative artificial intelligence after a recent bipartisan Senate report largely sidestepped the matter. READ MORE

 

Spring into Action when Disaster Strikes This eBook details the latest technology updates and trends in advancing first responder communications. DOWNLOAD

 

State Government Guide to Managing Grants To ensure your state is best managing grant dollars received and allocated, check out this guide for some best practices that address the most common challenges states face. DOWNLOAD

 

States Should Think Beyond Mobile Drivers' Licenses Other forms of digital ID will also be important for serving constituents online and preventing fraud. READ MORE

 

Strengthening Digital Identity and Preventing Fraud Research shows people prefer online state agency interactions but fear identity fraud. This paper offers strategies to simplify digital identity verification. DOWNLOAD

 

The Evolving Cyber Landscape: Insights from 2024 Reports Over the past month, the Verizon Data Breach Investigation Report and the Watchguard Technologies Internet Security Report were released. Here are some highlights. READ MORE 

 

The Rise of Hybrid Work in Government Government agencies rely on technology for their mission in a hybrid world, requiring solutions for remote work flexibility. DOWNLOAD

 

The State of Digital Identity in 2024 State agencies must accurately verify digital identities. This study explores their approaches to identity verification and fraud prevention. DOWNLOAD

 

Three Steps for Getting Started with AI Chatbots Many agencies use chatbots, but fewer leverage AI's full potential. This paper details three steps for kickstarting an AI chatbot program. DOWNLOAD


Verizon Frontline. Built to support mission response. The advanced network and technology for first responders. LEARN MORE [CONTENT PROVIDED BY VERIZON]

 

Weatherbeaten Maine Seeks More Resilient Infrastructure A new commission appointed by Maine Gov. Janet Mills will explore ways to make state infrastructure more resilient to climate change. READ MORE

 

What Successful City Parks Can Do They not only provide access to green space but make diverse communities feel safe and welcome, as a popular park in St. Paul, Minn., demonstrates. READ MORE

 

Which Cities Would Benefit Most from Converting Offices Into Housing? Local governments want to see empty and underused offices converted to housing, but that’s often difficult. An examination of office and housing markets reveals the specific cities where this approach is most promising. READ MORE

 

Why 1,000 Homicides in St. Louis Remain Unsolved This multipart investigation by St. Louis Public Radio, APM Reports and The Marshall Project explores how police in St. Louis — one of America’s deadliest cities — have struggled to solve killings, leaving thousands of family members without answers. READ MORE

 

Why Is It So Hard to Run Chicago? Mayor Brandon Johnson has struggled to accomplish big things, and his predecessor had an even harder time. History suggests some building blocks of mayoral success. READ MORE

 

Will Apple’s New OpenAI Deal Be a Game-Changer? The company unveiled a suite of new artificial intelligence capabilities in its newest operating system, including connecting its interactive voice feature Siri with OpenAI's ChatGPT.  READ MORE 


CAUTION

Subsequent court and administrative rulings, or changes to laws, rules and regulations may have modified or clarified or vacated or reversed the decisions summarized here. Accordingly, these summaries should be Shepardized® or otherwise checked to make certain that the most recent information is being considered by the reader.
THE MATERIAL ON THIS WEBSITE IS FOR INFORMATION ONLY. AGAIN, CHANGES IN LAWS, RULES, REGULATIONS AND NEW COURT AND ADMINISTRATIVE DECISIONS MAY AFFECT THE ACCURACY OF THE INFORMATION PROVIDED IN THIS LAWBLOG. THE MATERIAL PRESENTED IS NOT LEGAL ADVICE AND THE USE OF ANY MATERIAL POSTED ON THIS WEBSITE, OR CORRESPONDENCE CONCERNING SUCH MATERIAL, DOES NOT CREATE AN ATTORNEY-CLIENT RELATIONSHIP.
NYPPL Blogger Harvey Randall served as Principal Attorney, New York State Department of Civil Service; Director of Personnel, SUNY Central Administration; Director of Research, Governor’s Office of Employee Relations; and Staff Judge Advocate General, New York Guard. Consistent with the Declaration of Principles jointly adopted by a Committee of the American Bar Association and a Committee of Publishers and Associations, the material posted to this blog is presented with the understanding that neither the publisher nor NYPPL and, or, its staff and contributors are providing legal advice to the reader and in the event legal or other expert assistance is needed, the reader is urged to seek such advice from a knowledgeable professional.
New York Public Personnel Law. Email: publications@nycap.rr.com