January 2024 - Parks & Recreation - 41

human elements of their job, " he
says. " When our...staff is using it to
draft their memos or their blurbs for
brochures, they can take the 30 or 45
minutes back from that and go and interact
with our different afternoon fitness
programs, or they can take a little
bit of time...to talk to somebody on
the phone - versus sending a rushed
email - and make sure there's a little
extra personal touch there. "
Ultimately, a balance must be
maintained. Bhatt warns that too
much reliance on AI could lead to
people who are not accustomed to
face-to-face interaction. " How do
we ensure [our staff] is still culturally
sensitive, is still empathetic, is still
inclusive in what they do? " he asks.
" What I really want to emphasize
is DEAI - putting the DE [diversity,
equity] in AI, so we're always
talking innovation, but through the
lens of inclusion. "
Policies and Norms
Creating policies and norms around
AI can help to identify guardrails
that mitigate some of the risks of
using it. However, creating a " safe
zone " is no easy task when the target
is constantly moving.
One resource we can turn to for
guidance is the Blueprint for an
AI Bill of Rights, released by the
White House Office of Science and
Technology Policy
(tinyurl.com/
4muswjba). The blueprint identifies
five principles to " help guide
the design, use, and deployment
of automated systems to protect
the rights of the American public
in the age of artificial intelligence. "
Even with guidance, it's important
to continually assess how AI is being
used within your department and
whether changes to your practices
are needed. " Twelve months ago,
there was no ChatGPT available to
the public. Imagine in 12 months
Creating policies and
norms around AI
can help to identify
guardrails that mitigate
some of the risks of
using it.
how much and how fast things have
changed, " says Bhatt. " So, any policy
you [have], you have to be willing
to tweak it on an ongoing basis...
because the rate and scale of change
with AI is exponentially faster than
anything we've seen before. "
Another reason for
discussing
policies and norms is for transparency
and consistency. Many staff
may already be using AI for their
work unbeknownst to their leadership.
" As opposed to having one
or two people doing it on the side,
institutionalize the process so that
it becomes a culture where you
see AI as complementary and not
competitive, " says Bhatt.
Keeping Up and
Looking Ahead
While some park and recreation agencies
have begun to use AI for tasks like
administrative functions and marketing
materials, many look forward to
the help it could provide with social
media content creation, customer service,
security and maintenance, and
program development, NPP's survey
shows. " You have fewer people doing
that work faster, and then spending
more time reviewing and creatively
iterating and building versus starting
from scratch, " says Bhatt. " If [we
look] five years out, [I see] long-term
planning, design, architecture, capital
planning - all those pieces are going
to be impacted because AI can take in
all the designs around the world, look
at your prompts and create designs
that you would never even think of. "
For park and recreation agencies
looking to dip their toes into the
world of AI, Pitti's advice is to jump
in and try it. " Type in something as
simple as, 'Build me a job description
for the position that I have
coming up this summer' and understand
what it can put out there.
And then experiment with it. Take
an hour of your day, plug some different
things in - it will not be time
wasted whatsoever, " he says.
" Change is a constant. We can
either be forced to change, or we
can be a force for change, " says
Bhatt. " [We're] going to have to
spend time reskilling and training
staff on prompt engineering, AI
tools, machine learning, all the
rest. And [we're] going to have to
be willing to be nimble and change
constantly while being mindful of
the inherent bias that exists in AI.
And if we [do that], I think we will
come out just fine. "
Lindsay Collins is Managing Editor of Parks &
Recreation magazine (lcollins@nrpa.org).
PARK S ANDRECRE AT ION . OR G | J ANUAR Y 2 0 2 4 | Parks & Recreation
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http://tinyurl.com/4muswjba http://tinyurl.com/4muswjba
January 2024 - Parks & Recreation

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