California expands deliberative platform and generative AI pilots to shape wildfire recovery

Governor Gavin Newsom announced at an event in Downtown Los Angeles that the state is expanding a deliberative civic platform, engaged.ca.gov, and scaling generative AI pilots across multiple agencies to incorporate citizen input into decisions such as wildfire recovery.

The effort pairs a deliberative process developed with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and examples from Taiwan with generative AI tools intended to summarize public input and “close the loop” so participants can see how their ideas influenced policy. "We have a 28% conversion rate to people that signed up to people that are participating in it, industry standards about 5%," Newsom said, citing early participation metrics for the platform.

Why it matters: The administration says the platform is intended to move beyond one-time polls and town halls by creating deeper, two-way deliberations that produce concrete recommendations for policymakers. The initial use is to collect and refine community recommendations for wildfire recovery in Altadena and the Palisades; Newsom said the deliberative process is expected to conclude "in about 5 to 6 weeks." If the model is successful, officials said they intend to apply the approach to other policy areas.

Carnegie Endowment President Tino Cuellar and Taiwan’s Audrey Tang described the approach and international precedents. Tang, who represented Taiwan’s digital participation efforts, said generative AI can help identify common ideas and "discover the uncommon ground" between polarized viewpoints and cited Taiwan’s use of deliberation to shape policy. Tang said that in Taiwan a short deliberative process produced concrete proposals that were checked with stakeholders and led to legislation to limit fraudulent online advertisements.

Newsom and officials said the platform does not replace expert input; rather, it is intended to integrate public deliberation with scientific and technical expertise. The governor emphasized partnering with state employees and labor: he noted SEIU Local 1001 helped design the approach and described the work as being done "with" state workers, not "to" them.

Officials did not announce a new law or regulatory change at the event. Instead, they described this expansion as a combination of an existing executive branch directive on generative AI and procurement reforms described as "RFI 2," a sandbox-style process to let vendors and agencies iterate. Newsom and other speakers said the platform has already engaged thousands of Californians on the wildfire topic but did not provide a complete participant count.

What's next: The administration plans to expand the pilots to more departments and to keep testing how generative AI can summarize public input and provide feedback loops showing how citizen suggestions influenced decisions. No formal vote or legislative action was announced at the event.