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 

New York State local government and school district audits posted on the Internet

On June 14, 2024 New York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli announced the following local government and school district audits were issued.

Click on the text highlighted in color to access both the summary and the complete audit report

Gates Fire District – Board Oversight of Long-Term Planning (Monroe County)  The board and district officials did not properly plan for the district’s long-term financial and capital needs which inhibited the board and officials from effectively managing finances and addressing future operating and capital needs. Their efforts were hindered by inaccurate and inadequate financial records, reports and unrealistic budgeting. As a result, the board was not transparent with taxpayers and fund balance declined despite the board increasing the tax levy more than $7.5 million (80%) for 2020 through 2024.

Town of Poestenkill – Credit Card Purchases (Rensselaer County) The board did not ensure all credit card purchases were adequately supported, for legitimate purposes and approved before payment. As a result, the town paid $1,322 for inappropriate personal purchases including household and personal care items, video streaming services and clothes that were made by the former assistant using town resources. The assistant was arrested in March 2023 and pleaded guilty to a Class A misdemeanor for petit larceny in February 2024. She paid $2,640 in restitution, which included additional amounts uncovered during the investigation.

Red Hook Central School District – Inventories (Dutchess  County)  District officials did not adequately monitor and safeguard fuel and E-ZPass tags. As a result, officials cannot accurately account for fuel purchases and usage, or determine whether unauthorized E-ZPass charges occurred.

Charter School of Educational Excellence – Information Technology (IT) (Westchester County) The board and officials did not adequately secure student data to help protect it from unauthorized access or develop an IT contingency plan. As a result, there was an increased risk of unauthorized access to student personal, private and sensitive information and personally identifiable information. In addition, the school could suffer a serious interruption to operations since its ability to communicate during a disruption or disaster could affect the timely processing of its business functions.

Chautauqua Lake Central School District – Procurement (Chautauqua County) District officials did not procure fuel in compliance with the district’s policies. District officials did not seek competition for fuel purchases made from a single vendor totaling approximately $166,000, or adequately review purchases made to ensure charges were appropriate, resulting in approximately $2,200 in overpayments.

Harborfields Central School District – Information Technology Asset Management (Suffolk County) District officials did not ensure that IT assets were appropriately tracked, inventoried and safeguarded. Complete, accurate and up-to-date inventory records help district officials ensure that IT assets are properly insured, tracked through their life cycle and replaced as necessary. As a result, district officials cannot assure taxpayers that the $3.9 million invested in IT assets has been appropriately safeguarded.

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Plaintiff cited several nonexistent cases in his initial memorandum of law using "legal software applications" that "deploy artificial intelligence" and the Appellate Division cautioned Plaintiff that his pro se status does not excuse his failure to check the legal citations that he offers to a court

  

Dowlah v Professional Staff Congress

2024 NY Slip Op 02980

Decided on May 30, 2024

Appellate Division, First Department

Published by New York State Law Reporting Bureau pursuant to Judiciary Law § 431.

This opinion is uncorrected and subject to revision before publication in the Official Reports.

Decided and Entered: May 30, 2024
Before: Moulton, J.P., Scarpulla, Shulman, Higgitt, O'Neill Levy, JJ.

Index No. 151561/22 Appeal No. 2412 Case No. 2023-06121

[*1]Caf Dowlah, Plaintiff-Appellant,

v

Professional Staff Congress (PSC-CUNY), et al., Defendants-Respondents.

        Caf Dowlah, appellant pro se.

Levy Ratner, P.C., New York (Patricia McConnell of counsel), for Professional Staff Congress/City University of New York and Peter Zwiebach, respondents.

Wilson Elser Moskowitz Edelman & Dicker LLP, New York (Richard W. Boone, Jr. of counsel), for Hanan Kolko, respondent.

Order, Supreme Court, New York County (Eric Schumacher, J.), entered October 25, 2023, which granted defendants' motions to dismiss the complaint pursuant to CPLR 3211(a)(7), unanimously affirmed, without costs.

Plaintiff's legal malpractice claim against his union-appointed attorney who represented him in arbitration is preempted by Federal labor law, as "attorneys who perform services for and on behalf of a union may not be held liable in malpractice to individual grievants where the services performed constitute part of the collective bargaining process" (Mamorella v Derkasch, 276 AD2d 152, 155 [4th Dept 2000]).

Plaintiff's claims against his union, Professional Staff Congress (PSC-CUNY), and its legal director, arising from their selection of an allegedly biased arbitrator are barred by res judicata and collateral estoppel based on this Court's resolution of that issue in plaintiff's prior appeals (see Matter of Dowlah v City Univ. of N.Y., 189 AD3d 533, 534 [1st Dept 2020]; Dowlah v American Arbitration Assn., 221 AD3d 426, 426 [1st Dept 2023]). Plaintiff's instant claims are based on the same transaction as in both earlier actions, and therefore they are barred even though they are based upon different legal theories (Dowlah, 221 AD3d at 427). "That plaintiff has pleaded different causes of action and included new parties is of no moment" since "plaintiff, the party against whom preclusion is sought, was a party in the earlier action[s]" (id.).

To the extent plaintiff's claim against PSC-CUNY arises from its appointment of plaintiff's allegedly negligent attorney and thus raises a distinct issue, his allegations constitute a claim that he was improperly represented by his union, which is untimely under CPLR 217(2)(a)'s four-month limitations period (see Roman v City Empls. Union Local 237, 300 AD2d 142, 142 [1st Dept 2002], lv denied 100 NY2d 501 [2003]).

Res judicata also bars plaintiff from relitigating his prior appeals, and his arguments for recusal of Justices who participated in those appeals are entirely unsupported by evidence.

Plaintiff cites several nonexistent cases in his initial memorandum of law. In his reply brief he acknowledges that these citations were the result of research using "legal software applications" that deploy artificial intelligence. Plaintiff avers that he has an LLM (among other advanced degrees) but not much "legal expertise" and he apologizes for the fictitious precedents. We caution plaintiff that his pro se status does not excuse his failure to check the legal citations that he offers to a court.

We have considered plaintiff's remaining arguments and find them unavailing.

THIS CONSTITUTES THE DECISION AND ORDER OF THE SUPREME COURT, APPELLATE DIVISION, FIRST DEPARTMENT.

ENTERED: May 30, 2024

Where there is a conflict in the testimony offered in the course of a disciplinary hearing and either of two inferences may be drawn, the duty of choosing between the inferences is the agency's, and the courts may not reject the agency's choice

 

Matter of Henn v Sewell

2024 NY Slip Op 02984

Decided on May 30, 2024

Appellate Division, First Department

Published by New York State Law Reporting Bureau pursuant to Judiciary Law § 431.

This opinion is uncorrected and subject to revision before publication in the Official Reports.

Decided and Entered: May 30, 2024
Before: Moulton, J.P., Scarpulla, Shulman, Higgitt, O'Neill Levy, JJ.

Index No. 152739/23 Appeal No. 2401 Case No. 2023-05125

[*1]In the Matter of Brian Henn, Petitioner,

v

Keechant L. Sewell etc., et al., Respondents.

Worth, London & Martinez, LLP, New York (Stuart Gold of counsel), for petitioner.

Sylvia O. Hinds-Radix, Corporation Counsel, New York (Geoffrey E. Curfman of counsel), for respondents.

        Determination of respondent Police Commissioner, dated November 29, 2022, which, to the extent appealed from as limited by the briefs, found petitioner guilty of two charges of inappropriate statements and one charge of inaccurate statements during an investigation, unanimously confirmed, the petition denied, and the proceeding brought pursuant to CPLR article 78 (transferred to this Court by order, Supreme Court, New York County [Kathleen Waterman-Marshall, J.], entered October 5, 2023), dismissed, without costs.

The determination is supported by substantial evidence (see generally 300 Gramatan Ave. Assoc. v State Div. of Human Rights, 45 NY2d 176, 179-180 [1978]). The New York City Police Department (NYPD) carefully weighed the evidence before it, discussing in detail the strengths and weaknesses of the testimonial and documentary evidence. Based on this analysis, the NYPD determined that petitioner had made inappropriate statements motivated by ethnicity and perceived religious affiliation. The Commissioner also had a rational basis for finding that petitioner provided an inaccurate statement during the investigation regarding his inability to recall sending offensive images by text to another officer, given the memorable nature of the images and that petitioner testified that he did not send the images to anyone else. Moreover, petitioner later testified at the hearing that he did recall sending the images to the officer. "[W]here there is a conflict in the testimony and either of two inferences may be drawn, the duty of choosing between the inferences is the agency's, and the courts may not reject the agency's choice" (Matter of Fields v New York State Off. of Children & Family Servs., 198 AD3d 454, 455 [1st Dept 2021]).

We have considered petitioner's remaining arguments and find them unavailing.

THIS CONSTITUTES THE DECISION AND ORDER OF THE SUPREME COURT, APPELLATE DIVISION, FIRST DEPARTMENT.

ENTERED: May 30, 2024

 

Paid Parental Leave for PBANYS – Agency Police Services Unit (APSU) Employees

The New York State Department of Civil Service has posted its Policy Bulletin 2024-04, Paid Parental Leave for PBANYS – Agency Police Services Unit (APSU) Employees, on the Internet.

The text of Policy Bulletin 2024-04 is posted on the Internet at: https://www.cs.ny.gov/attendance_leave/PolBull24-04.cfm 

A printable version of Policy Bulletin 2024-04 in PDF format is posted on the Internet at: https://www.cs.ny.gov/attendance_leave/PB2024-04Combined.pdf

To view previous Attendance and Leave bulletins issued by the Department of Civil Service, visit: https://www.cs.ny.gov/attendance_leave/index.cfm