North Carolina State Treasurer Brad Briner announced that his department has integrated artificial intelligence (AI) into its daily workflow following a successful 12-week pilot program with OpenAI last year.
The department spearheaded the first AI program in state government, using it in the department’s Unclaimed Property and State and Local Government divisions.
The announcement of the partnership took place in the North Carolina Central University Student Center in Durham, the AI hub for area HBCUs, in March 2025.
Briner said in August that the program had very good results using ChatGPT.
“What we’ve learned first, and perhaps most unsurprisingly, is that this technology saves a material amount of time,” he said. “We estimate, thanks to our friends at North Carolina Central University, which conducted the evaluation, that it improved the productivity of our employees by about 10% in the early phases of the trial. That last piece is important because the second thing we learned is that it kept improving, and it would have kept improving had the trial not ended. So we did not get to maximum productivity in the 12 weeks which we did this. And then third, we were able to orient our people towards more complex and human-centered interactions, which are inherently more productive and satisfying.”
Dr. Siobahn Day Grady, the founding director of the university’s Institute for Artificial Intelligence and Emerging Research (IAIER), said the 48-page report shows that the employees using ChatGPT expressed relief, enthusiasm, and delight. Overall, 71% had a very positive sentiment when using ChatGPT, while 7% had a neutral sentiment.
Employees began saving 15 to 30 minutes in the beginning of the initial survey, with the time going up to about 30 to 60 minutes a day with the final survey.
The department continued testing use cases and multiple AI engines, and, with the testing phase complete, training and implementation of AI are underway throughout the department.
“We have a moral obligation to the taxpayer to use their money wisely,” Briner said in a press release. “That means improving the efficiency of everything we do as state government, and artificial intelligence is already being used throughout the private sector with stunning results. Our 12-week pilot program with OpenAI showed up to 10% increased productivity in certain divisions. We expect that implementing AI tools across the department will replicate that productivity increase across our entire team, leading to a better return for your taxpayer dollars.”
All division members have undergone training to maximize the use of AI engines and streamline their day-to-day tasks, while adhering to the privacy standards that they have always followed. The department has developed a strict policy governing the use of AI to ensure the safe and secure protection of all personal and private data.
The department has multiple divisions with very different functions, and as a result, multiple different engines have been deployed. Examples of use include coding, audit comparisons, deep research, brainstorming, finding hidden data, assisting with legal compliance, etc.
The department’s information technology team will track AI use and effectiveness throughout the transition.