Alabama has promoted Aaron Wright, the state’s director of application development, as its first chief artificial intelligence officer.
The appointment, first reported by Government Technology, comes two years after Gov. Kay Ivey signed in an executive order creating a generative AI task force. The group was charged with understanding how state agencies use AI, encouraging the responsible and effective use of the technology and recommending policies and procedures for future uses in executive agencies.
GovTech reported that Wright’s first day was Monday. State officials did not respond to requests Monday to verify details of his appointment.
Last year, the task force released its first report, which found that almost a quarter of Alabama agencies were already putting generative AI to use in a variety of applications, including text generation, language translation, software code development and complex problem-solving.
Wright, who has held the director of application development role at the the Alabama Office of Information Technology for over four years, also led the task force’s working group on data management and ownership, GovTech reported. According to Wright’s LinkedIn profile, he held roles at the Alabama Department of Rehabilitation Services and in the healthcare industry, before joining the state IT agency in 2022, totaling almost 30 years of IT experience.