Conditions
Local Interventions
Attach Strong Conditions to Government Procurement of AI Technology
Increasingly, governments are turning to third-party tech vendors to outsource technical skills and automate key government functions. This in turn depletes in-house technical expertise and diminishes the quality of government services for all people. In the event that a local government agency must pilot, purchase, or otherwise use AI technology, local governments should attach conditions […]
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Increasingly, governments are turning to third-party tech vendors to outsource technical skills and automate key government functions. This in turn depletes in-house technical expertise and diminishes the quality of government services for all people. In the event that a local government agency must pilot, purchase, or otherwise use AI technology, local governments should attach conditions to ensure that vendors, products, and city agencies abide by these strong accountability measures.1 Conditions must be binding and legally enforceable, and must exist as grounds to reject or void contracts if and where tech firms cannot abide by accountability measures.
- For guidance, see Accountable Tech et al., Zero Trust AI Governance, August 10, 2023, https://ainowinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Zero-Trust-AI-Governance.pdf; Roya Pakzad and Cynthia Conti-Cook, Key Considerations When Procuring AI in the Public Sector, Taraaz and The Collaborative Research Center for Resilience (CRCR), 2025, https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5d159d288addab0001036c45/t/6890f9066bf93951bedd9485/1754331401682/AI_Procurement_Taraaz_CRCR_2025.pdf; and Rashida Richardson, Best Practices for Government Procurement of Data-Driven Technologies, May 2021, https://riipl.rutgers.edu/files/2021/05/Best-Practices-for-Government-Technology-Procurement-May-2021.pdf. ↩︎