California Data Officer Lally Steps Away From Role

Jason Lally, who has served as the state’s chief data officer (CDO), announced his decision to depart the role in a post on LinkedIn this week.

The technologist came to state service by way of the city and county of San Francisco
government, initially serving as a special consultant to the chief data officer. In November 2021, Lally was appointed as deputy chief data officer, where he served for just over a year before taking the deputy director role over data services and engineering within the Office of Data and Innovation. He would go on from that role to become the state’s CDO in June 2024.

In his LinkedIn post, Lally said his decision was not reached easily, noting that it has been “an extraordinary privilege to serve the people of California.”

“As I step away from the role, I don’t see an ending. I see evidence. The work continues — not as a monument, but as a living system. There is a team now. A resilient one. Capable of adapting to future challenges because we built it that way,” Lally wrote in a blog post he shared on LinkedIn.

Lally was a staunch advocate for the people behind the data, voicing his belief that data not only needs to be managed safely and securely, but also that the work is done ethically.

“We’ve mistaken innovation for churn. For speed. For personality. But maybe real innovation — especially in government — isn’t about how fast you go, or how shiny the launch looks. Maybe it’s about whether the thing still works after you’re gone,” he continued in the blog post.

Lally's full blog post can be found here.