Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts (CPA) CIO Jay Waldo spoke at an Industry Insider — Texas briefing on Thursday, where he detailed the agency’s upcoming solicitations, automation needs and position on AI.
Waldo explained that the tax side of the agency is growing rapidly as the state grows its number of citizens and businesses, particularly with the introduction of sales taxes for online businesses.
To meet the increased demand, CPA created a task force whose job is to identify opportunities for back-office process improvements and automation, an area experts at an IT Caucus panel in October agreed would be perfect for AI implementation.
According to the CIO, the agency is “all in” on AI, and is currently using it to inform decisions and increase productivity.
“There’s lots of opportunities there,” said Waldo. “We are already diving into it. One thing you know, one of our projects that we're just now implementing is using AI to look at when people don't pay their taxes on time. How can we decide — what are the odds this person is going to pay their taxes a day late without us doing anything versus having to call them. We have to do something, so it helps us narrow down our most efficient way to get ahold of them.”
Regarding future procurements, Waldo stressed that products using AI must provide a notable improvement over current solutions rather than a lateral shift.
According to Waldo, CPA’s largest upcoming project in terms of spending is a replacement for its back-end consolidated financial system, which vendors currently interact with to receive payments for procurements. A solicitation for this project is expected to go live early next calendar year.
Another upcoming solicitation the CIO shared is a restructuring of the agency’s tax call centers, particularly automation with virtual agents or chat bots to shorten wait times for callers.
Waldo also listed disaster recovery, cybersecurity and privilege access management as areas of focus for upcoming solicitations.
State Comptroller CIO Names Automation as Prime Spending Area
According to Jay Waldo, CIO for the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts, the agency’s largest upcoming project in terms of spending is a replacement for its back-end consolidated financial system.
