Vinal Dalcy Dsouza and Rebecca Williams Earle, Northeastern University
We are partnering with the City of Oakland to understand how AI can safely support city workflows and processes. Federal cuts are increasing the strain on local governments, which must meet community needs with fewer resources. Artificial intelligence is often proposed as a solution, but local governments can be wary due to privacy and equity concerns. Oakland is piloting Microsoft Copilot, and we are measuring participant experiences and perceptions throughout the study through interviews and surveys with a sample of participants from a variety of city departments. We will share snapshots of participant perceptions of AI and privacy from multiple touchpoints during this 6 month study. We will also discuss how privacy and equity concerns, including public record requests, disparities in AI access, and fears of skill atrophy, shaped and in some cases, limited participant engagement with AI.
Authors: Shufan Chai, Vinal Dalcy Dsouza, Rebecca Williams Earle, Rasika Bhalerao and Jessica Staddon
Vinal Dalcy Dsouza is a research assistant and Master's student in Computer Science at Northeastern University's Oakland campus. With around five years of hands‑on data engineering experience, she enjoys digging into messy real‑world data, making it usable, and then building systems that keep it flowing. She's especially interested in where data engineering and AI meet and what can go wrong there from security risks to responsible use. Before grad school, she earned her bachelor's degree in Information Science with a focus on business intelligence, which still shapes how she thinks about data, value, and impact in her work.
Rebecca Williams Earle is a research assistant and Master's student in Computer Science at Northeastern University's Oakland campus. Her interests include security, privacy, and accessibility. She holds a BA from Williams College and has over six years of professional software engineering experience focusing on front-end development and web accessibility. She's particularly interested in the intersection of human-centered design and technical security, and how to build systems that protect users without creating barriers to access.
author = {Vinal Dalcy Dsouza and Rebecca Williams Earle},
title = {Adopting {AI} in Local Government with Privacy and Equity in Mind: A Case Study of the City of Oakland},
year = {2026},
address = {Santa Clara, CA},
publisher = {USENIX Association},
month = jun
}