Officials from the Los Angeles County Department of Public Social Services (DPSS) and Internal Services Department (ISD) last week shared their strategies for the coming years during a recent Industry Insider member briefing.
The event in Hacienda Heights, Calif., was held June 24, and featured IT leaders from DPSS, ISD and the Probation Department.
DPSS Assistant Director and CIO Laura Chavez leads IT operations for one of the county’s larger departments. It handles critical services such as Medicaid and food assistance distributions for a caseload of about 3.5 million individuals, all with a staff of 14,000 county employees.
The technology footprint of the organization is even leaner, relying on around 400 technical staff to run daily IT operations and more than 80 in-house developed applications.
Chavez explained that a primary concern of the department is creating the sort of cost efficiencies that allow for future innovations. The county, like many others, is strapped for cash, with the added strain of a $4 billion settlement, the ongoing impacts of recent wildfires, and changes to state and federal funding. She calls it a “trifecta” of financial constraints, adding that departments were all being tasked with finding cost savings back in December.
“That's the lens that I'm looking through as I'm trying to balance again and bringing quality technology, but continuing with innovation, because I need to create efficiencies for my workforce, so we're going to end up having to do more with less, and that's always been a constant battle,” she said.
The department CIO said there is significant interest in AI technologies, but that interest must be weighed against external considerations, such as concerns from labor unions.
“My staff loves AI — we want to do more on AI — but I'm trying to balance that with the fact that on the labor side, they hear, you know, employee reduction, right? They hear, you know, you're creating efficiencies, and you're not going to need that same staff,” she said. “So I'm constantly in damage control mode trying to alleviate the anxiety level on the labor side, in order to be able to boost up and to promote the efficiencies that can be gained for the staff.”
While generative AI has been used to boost efficiency through projects such as transcriptions and reverse engineering reports that lacked critical information, Chavez said new projects need to pass muster with ISD before they can be implemented at scale. Vendors coming to the table with this sort of technology should be prepared to take it before a review board before anything else can happen.
“We can't just flip a switch and turn on AI at the department level without that review and approval,” she said.
Chavez urged the vendors in attendance to consider providing no-cost proof of concepts when bringing AI technologies to the county to help assess possible applications of the technology.
One of the priorities for the department is ensuring that the data shared with its more than 500 community and faith-based organizations is protected. Chavez said the varying levels of sophistication prompted staff to create webinars that help to bring organizations up to speed from a security perspective.
As its name implies, the county’s Internal Services Department serves a number of critical, technical roles that the 39 other departments draw from. It operates under a cost-recovery model.
ISD’s application portfolio probably isn’t where vendors will find their “in.” Acting Deputy General Manager Vinnie Chin explained that her unit supports around 400 applications, with efforts focused on building effective in-house solutions over buying new tools wherever possible.
“We're focused on leveraging what we have internally, and trying to build a lot of applications in-house, and because there is a lot of need, and also we have to fast-track a lot of the development process. We're trying to leverage low-code, no-code as much as possible,” she said.
Chin said a lot of her team’s focus is also being put toward process improvement and streamlining business operations across the county. One potential opportunity on the horizon could be the move from ISD’s COBOL mainframe technology to a more modern solution.
“Believe it or not, we still have a lot of areas that still do a lot of business in Excel, so ... also moving that to a new platform as well, whether it's a low-code, no-code or .NET platform,” she said.
Chin said her department is exploring the use of AI to help staff quickly navigate the county’s many policies, rather than having to call an expert. Similarly, AI could eventually help with the onboarding of new staff and language translation for the county’s many ethnic groups.
When it comes to approaching the county for new business, Chin had some advice for vendors: come prepared and know the business, offer proofs of concept where possible and be registered as one of the county’s approved partners.
The process to register can take several months, Chin said, so it is best to have it sorted before reaching out to officials with a product or service.
In L.A. County, Innovation Contends With a ‘Trifecta’ of Financial Woes
What to Know
- Officials said the need to balance innovation with financial and workforce constraints has never been more critical, especially in light of a $4 billion settlement and reduced state and federal funding.
- Vendors were urged to bring no-cost proof-of-concept projects, be familiar with agency-specific needs, and ensure they're registered as approved partners.
