Embracing AI Responsibly in Lake County
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is rapidly becoming an integral part of modern operations, and Lake County is taking proactive steps to ensure its responsible use. The County Board has recently adopted two key AI policies:
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Governance Policy – Establishes oversight and accountability for AI initiatives
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Usage Policy – Provides clear guidance on ethical and responsible AI use
These policies are essential to protecting Lake County’s assets, workforce, residents, and reputation from potential risks such as misuse, bias, or security vulnerabilities.
AI presents exciting opportunities to improve government services—from enhancing citizen engagement and streamlining case management to automating routine tasks and improving knowledge sharing. However, with these opportunities come important responsibilities. Legal, ethical, privacy, and security considerations must be prioritized to ensure AI systems are reliable, safe, and secure.
To support this effort, it is vital that every County employee understands and adheres to the Artificial Intelligence (AI) End User Usage Policy. This policy empowers employees to leverage AI effectively while minimizing associated risks. From a user’s perspective, here are three key takeaways:
1. Use only approved AI tools that have passed the County’s formal evaluation process.
2. Sign the AI Usage Policy and Ethical Charter before engaging with any AI technologies.
3. Verify and validate AI-generated content to ensure accuracy and reliability.
The policy will be placed on ESP and more information will be forthcoming from EIT as this policy is implemented.
With managerial approval, employees are encouraged to use approved AI systems ethically and responsibly to enhance productivity and efficiency. But please…. Ask before you do it and validate the results!
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  Learn About the County's
ARPA Projects
In 2021, Lake County received $135.2 million in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding. Since then, every dollar has been allocated to nearly 90 projects, addressing both immediate pandemic response needs and long-term investments for our community's future.
Funding has supported emergency priorities such as food assistance, rental relief and personal protective equipment (PPE) distribution during the pandemic, and has also been invested in enhancing public safety, economic opportunities, infrastructure, sustainability and building healthy, inclusive and resilient communities.
Projects and programs funded through ARPA have been tracked through yearly updates. To learn more about the many completed and ongoing projects funded through ARPA, check out the ARPA book detailing the incredible efforts made across the county.
 Introducing Our Newest Assistant County Administrator
This week the County Administrator’s Office welcomed Lacey Simpson to the team as our newest Assistant County Administrator. She is an accomplished manager with experience in leading cross-functional teams, optimizing operations and fostering collaboration to drive organizational success.
She formerly worked in the Lake County Human Resources department from 2014 to 2017 where she was best known for developing and implementing highly successful programs for mentoring and leadership development.
Her extensive experience in process improvement, project management and interdepartmental collaboration will be a great addition to the County Administration team.
Project OneLake Update:
End-to-End Testing Continues!
 Workday will officially replace BOSS (Oracle) this December as Lake County’s new Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system.
In recent weeks, the Project OneLake Team met with Strada consultants in Waukegan to finalize testing scenarios and tester assignments. This important step validates processes to ensure everything is running smoothly and is aligned across departments and workstreams. Complete process testing, from start to finish, continues through the end of August.
Workday offers a range of features to support productivity and accountability. As an employee, you’ll use Workday for tasks like requesting time off and reporting absences. While both Time Tracking and Absence Management relate to how time is managed, they serve different purposes in Workday. Watch this video to learn how it works.
 You're invited to attend the next Green Team Lunch and Learn on August 28 from 12 to 1 p.m. Enjoy your lunch while discussing the Environmental Impacts of Artificial Intelligence. This Lunch and Learn will be a book club style program. Read this article about AI and water use and this article about AI and energy consumption to prepare for the moderated discussion. Learn something new and enjoy a fun discussion with coworkers on these relevant topics!
Environmental Impacts of Artificial Intelligence
Thursday, August 28
12 - 1 p.m.
Food Trucks Still Rolling In
Sign Up for Email Updates so You Don't Miss a Visit
 Food trucks are still visiting the designated food truck spaces around the Waukegan campus to liven up our lunch hour for the remainder of summer. Look for food trucks offering everything from tacos to burgers to BBQ and sweet treats. We hope you’ll join us in supporting these local vendors. Learn more and see the food truck schedule on the Food Truck ESP page.
If you’re interested in getting food truck information and updates in your inbox, sign-up for our mailing list.
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