Texas appoints state’s first chief AI and innovation officer
Texas on Wednesday appointed its first chief AI and innovation officer, naming Tony Sauerhoff to lead a new AI division inside the Texas Department of Information Resources.
Sauerhoff steps into the role after serving for one year as Texas’s chief information security officer, where he helped establish a portal for local government agencies to report cybersecurity incidents. He also held cybersecurity roles at the U.S. Courts and the Marine Corps Reserve.
In his new role, he’ll help Texas agencies determine how to test, evaluate and use AI tools effectively. The division is also working on a state AI code of ethics and shared procurement tools for technology.
With Sauerhoff’s appointment, Texas joins several states — including New York and Vermont — that have also hired chief AI officers, or similar positions, in recent years, reflecting the growing influence of generative AI in state government. The hires follow Former President Joe Biden’s 2023 executive order formalizing the role for federal agencies meant to establish a “safe, secure, and trustworthy use of artificial intelligence.”
New York State’s technology bureau in March hired Shreya Amin as the state’s chief AI officer, tasking her with refining the Information Technology Services’ guidance on AI and modernizing the state’s technology offerings.
Vermont’s Agency of Digital Services last year combined its AI and data teams, and appointed Josiah Raiche as chief data and AI officer to lead them. Raiche has advocated for the state to establish a code of ethics around the use of generative AI before writing formal policies.
“We’re really looking at how we’ll use AI to solve some of our workforce challenges, to make experiences better for Vermonters,” Raiche said during StateScoop’s IT Modernization Summit last year.
And last month, Montana hired Christopher Tarabochia, a former product manager for Microsoft’s Xbox division, as its first chief AI officer “to lead strategy, ethical use, and collaboration across agencies, schools, tribal governments, universities, and industry,” according to a job listing.
