6
minute read
If you work in communications for a local government or utility, chances are you have more work lately and less time to do it. And so, you are AI-curious. You wonder, can it really make your life easier, or is it all just hype about a bunch of slop? Most communicators I talk to have started using AI the same way: as a faster first draft. It saves time, and that matters when you are a one- or two-person shop covering everything from media relations to public hearings to website updates. But the real value of AI for communicators is not just speed. It is the ability to do work you did not have the capacity to do before, or to do familiar work at a level of quality you could not yet achieve.
Raftelis’ communications team has been testing a variety of tools across dozens of use cases over the last five months using our own proprietary AI platform that we’re making available to clients. Here are 13 ways we have found AI tools to be worth the hype for local government and utility communicators.
1. Go beyond polling in presentations. Most of us have used tools like Mentimeter or Slido to get a quick audience poll during a presentation. AI takes this further. We have built interactive slide decks that let the audience explore rate scenarios, click through project timelines, or drill into data visualizations during a live meeting. Instead of passively watching slides, your audience is engaged with the material, which changes with their input, live on screen.
2. Turn mountains of stakeholder input into themes you can act on. If you have ever stared at a stack of public comment cards and tried to pull out the key themes by hand, you know how long that takes. We have used AI to process all that input, organize it into themes, identify outliers, and flag the issues that occurred most frequently. What used to take days takes an afternoon, and the analysis is more consistent because you are not fatigued by hundreds of responses.
3. Translate technical documents into public-ready summaries. Rate studies, capital improvement plans, technical reports: these are just some of the documents written by engineers and financial analysts. But they are often not right for the public. AI can take a 60-page study and produce a two-page summary written at an eighth-grade reading level. You still review and refine it, but you are starting from something solid rather than a blank page or a dense PDF.
4. Build your FAQ from your own history. Every public entity faces the same 30 questions at every public meeting. The answers are scattered across old presentations, board packets, and the memory of whoever has been around the longest. AI can pull from your past meeting minutes, public comments, and staff reports to assemble a living FAQ document. When a new question comes in, you are not starting from scratch.
5. Read the room at scale. When you get 500 written comments on a proposed ballot measure, you need to understand what people are truly saying, not just count how many said they oppose it. AI can analyze sentiment and sort comments by concern: affordability, fairness, ease-of-implementation, and trust in leadership. That gives you a real picture of where your community stands and helps you respond to what people care about.
6. Make content accessible without a separate workflow. New ADA rules require greater accessibility for all audiences: Alt text for images. Plain-language versions of technical documents. Drafts in Spanish or Vietnamese for multilingual communities. These are things most communicators know they should be doing and do not have time for. AI makes accessibility part of the process rather than an afterthought.
7. Turn raw data into real stories. You have a spreadsheet showing five years of water consumption trends, or a table comparing your fees to those at neighboring towns. AI can turn that into a chart, an infographic-style summary, or an interactive data visualization that a board member or resident can understand. Note, you may still need a professional graphic designer to make it look good and in your brand style.
8. Assemble pre-meeting packages. Before a public hearing or council presentation, your team needs background on prior decisions, relevant stakeholder positions, past public comments on the topic, and talking points. Pulling all of that together from different sources is hours of work. AI can compile and organize that background material, so your team walks in prepared and ready to participate.
9. Audit your own communications for consistency and gaps. How consistent is your messaging across your website, social media, bill inserts, and public presentations? AI can review your existing materials and flag where messages conflict, where information is outdated, or where key topics are missing entirely. Think of it as a communications audit you can run anytime, not just when you hire a consultant.
10. Generate board packet summaries for elected officials. Board members get thick packets and limited time. AI can produce concise briefing summaries for each agenda item, highlighting what changed since the last meeting, the staff recommendation, and likely questions. Your board members show up better prepared, and your meetings run more smoothly.
11. Stress-test your messages. Before you roll out messaging about a rate increase or a new policy, AI can help you think through how different audiences might react to the news. Give it your draft message and ask it to respond as a skeptical ratepayer, a local business owner, or a council member facing reelection. It is not a substitute for real community input, but it helps you stress-test your language before it goes public.
12. Create materials for front-line staff. Your front desk staff, field crews, and customer service teams are often the first point of contact with the public, but they don’t always have the latest messaging. AI can turnkey messages into quick-reference guides, call scripts, or short briefing documents tailored to each audience. Everyone stays on the same page without the need for an extra training session.
13. Spruce up your social media content calendar. Most of our clients plan and post social media content on the same day. But what if you could have all your posts and image ideas for the month done two weeks before the month starts? AI can use your key message platform to create clever posts in a tone and voice that’s more entertaining, upbeat, or insightful than you might be feeling on a particular day. It can scrape your website and any documents you feed it to sketch out the next 30 days of content, image descriptions, hashtags, and captions. Just make sure you review for accuracy and tone and adjust as unexpected issues arise.
Hopefully these use cases provide you with some fresh ideas, because writing a faster first draft is great, but that’s the least of what these tools can do for you.
We’re curious how else you have been using AI for your everyday tasks.
Reach out to share your ideas or learn more about how you can get access to Raftelis’ proprietary AI tools at svillegas@raftelis.com.
Link copied
