By Matt Nelles

Walk into a small city hall five years from now, and it may look remarkably familiar. The same council chambers. The same desks. The same public works trucks parked outside. But behind the scenes, the way work gets done could be very different.

A city clerk may have an AI assistant preparing the first draft of meeting minutes. A public works director may use AI to analyze years of maintenance records and identify streets most likely to need attention. A resident might ask a city website a question about a building permit at 10 p.m. and receive an immediate answer. And an employee with an idea for a new software tool might simply describe what they need, and have artificial intelligence build a working prototype in minutes.

That may be the most important AI story for small cities: not replacing people, but giving a small number of people the capabilities of a much larger organization.

An extra set of hands

Small city government has always faced a capacity challenge. A handful of employees may be responsible for an astonishing range of functions, from finance and permitting to communications and records management.

AI is well suited to many of the tasks that consume staff time but don’t necessarily require human creativity or judgment.

It can draft correspondence, summarize lengthy documents, analyze spreadsheets, organize information, create first drafts of reports, and help prepare grant applications. It can turn a meeting transcript into a preliminary set of minutes, or transform a collection of notes into a newsletter.

Individually, these tasks may seem insignificant. Collectively, they represent hours of work. Those time savings could give staff more room to focus on residents, projects, and the problems that require their attention.

A new front door to city hall

The next wave of AI may be more visible to residents. Today, getting an answer from city hall often requires knowing where to look or whom to call. An AI-powered city website could make that experience considerably simpler.

A resident could type: “I’m building a shed in my backyard. Do I need a permit?”

Instead of searching through a municipal website, the resident could receive an immediate explanation, links to the applicable regulations, the appropriate form, and instructions for submitting it. The same approach could handle questions about garbage collection, snow emergencies, utility payments, park reservations, zoning, licenses, and public meetings.

Instead of figuring out where to find information, residents could simply ask a question and get directed to the information they need.

When city employees become app developers

Maybe the most intriguing development for small cities is vibe coding. The term describes a new approach to software development in which a person explains what they want an application to do in ordinary language, and an AI system generates much of the underlying code.

Imagine a public works employee saying:

“I need a tool where staff can photograph a pothole, record its location, assign it to a crew, and mark it complete.”

An AI coding system may be able to produce a functioning prototype in hours.

That doesn’t mean the city should immediately deploy it. Security, privacy, accessibility, reliability, and data management still require human expertise and oversight. But the gap between “we have a problem” and “we have a tool to address it” is becoming much smaller. Some experiments will fail. Others may become indispensable.

Don’t hand the keys to the robot

There is, of course, a catch.

Government decisions have consequences. An incorrect AI-generated restaurant recommendation is inconvenient. An incorrect answer about a zoning requirement, tax bill, or public benefit can create a much bigger problem.

Small cities will need thoughtful AI policies: What information can employees put into an AI system? When does an AI-generated answer require human review? How should residents know when they are interacting with AI? Who is ultimately accountable for the result?

Human oversight will still be essential. AI can summarize a 200- page document, but staff still need to understand the information and decide how it applies. The same goes for communications with residents. AI can help draft a response, but someone at the city should review it and stand behind the final answer. And while AI may be able to build a working prototype, staff still need to evaluate whether it’s secure, reliable, and appropriate for public use.

The small-city advantage

Large cities will likely make major investments in AI. They’ll have technology departments, large budgets, and teams of specialists.

Small cities have something different: proximity.

The person who understands the problem may be sitting three doors down from the person who can make a decision about solving it. A city manager or department head can see a problem, experiment with a solution, and learn from the results without navigating layers of organizational bureaucracy.

The AI-powered small city probably won’t arrive with a ribbon-cutting ceremony. Instead, changes will likely happen gradually, as cities try AI in different parts of their operations.

An employee will use AI to save an hour. A department will automate a repetitive task. A resident will get an answer without calling city hall. Someone will build a little application that unexpectedly becomes indispensable.

Five years from now, the work of running a small city may look much the same. The difference may be how much staff can accomplish with the resources they already have.

Matt Nelles is the IT member consultant with the League of Minnesota Cities. Contact: [email protected] or (651) 420-8119.