PRESS RELEASE

Above: Community members participate in a Long Beach Collaboratory session to design and deploy technologies in Long Beach neighborhoods.

Long Beach, CA – The City of Long Beach Department of Technology and Innovation (TID) has released its Annual Report for the Technology Planning and Partnerships Division, which manages the City’s Smart City Initiative, data privacy program, and technology strategic planning efforts for implementing emerging technology solutions. This report highlights the achievements of the City’s innovative technology and data privacy initiatives in the past year and is shared publicly to highlight the City’s progress in delivering valuable technology programs and services to the Long Beach community and ensuring the technology deployed is ethical, responsible and useful.

"I am proud of our City Team's progress in ensuring the technology deployed in Long Beach is ethical, responsible and valuable to all our residents," said Mayor Rex Richardson. "Technology in service of the public good, especially for our most underserved residents, matters more than ever."

Now available on the City’s Smart City Initiative webpage, the 2024 Annual Report features notable accomplishments including: 

• Published a Generative AI Guidance that provides best practices and tips for City staff to maximize use of Generative AI (Gen AI) tools safely and ethically. Additionally, introduced a use case registry to offer more in-depth guidance for some of the more popular staff use cases for Gen AI (such as writing and analysis) and conducted three trainings to educate staff on how to responsibly use Gen AI.
• Launched the second cohort of Long Beach Collaboratory (LB Co-Lab) in November 2024, an immersive technology program for Long Beach residents to design and deploy technologies in their neighborhood and gain career skills to find tech jobs. The first LB Co-Lab cohort ran from March to October 2023 and demonstrated significant success with over $200,000 invested in four community projects that were successfully deployed in city parks and public spaces, directly improving residents’ quality of life, and ultimately proving itself as a national blueprint for resident-driven technology implementation. LB Co-Lab was recognized as a finalist for the 2024 IDC Smart Cities North America Awards.
• Sustained a Civic User Research practice that engages Long Beach community members to evaluate the usability and effectiveness of the City’s digital services, tools, websites and products to ensure they are accessible to all Long Beach residents. Successfully initiated six user research projects, including one for the AI Chatbot pilot, Ask Elby, and five projects with City Departments, such as Health and Human Services, Library, and Public Works, in partnership with volunteers from the U.S. Digital Response.
• Launched enhanced Digital Rights Platform webpage to inform the public about the City’s use of smart technologies (e.g. cameras, sensors, smart lamp posts) and data collection practices. This initiative promotes data privacy, digital rights, and transparency across 25 civic technologies, with plans for future additions. The platform offers educational resources and a feedback channel for community input, fostering dialogue between the City and Long Beach residents. As part of this effort, the City facilitated 12 community workshops and events to educate residents about their data privacy rights and best practices to keep their data secure.

“Our Technology Planning and Partnerships team supports ethical tech adoption to improve City services, protect resident data, and include the public in decision-making,” said Lea Eriksen, Director of the Technology and Innovation Department. “We aim to ensure residents understand and trust the City’s technology is used in a manner that benefits all community members.”

The annual report follows the City’s 2024 recognition as the number one Top Digital City in its population category by the Center for Digital Government, making Long Beach the first city to receive first place for four consecutive years. Last year the City also received the SoCal CIO Large Enterprise, which honors technology leadership in organizations with over $1.5 billion in annual revenue ORBIE Award, which honors technology leadership in organizations with over $1.5 billion in annual revenue. More recently, the City was named a finalist in the 2025 IDC Smart Cities North America Awards, which recognizes successful projects and initiatives that use technology innovation to solve challenges in partnership with the community and smart city ecosystem.

The Technology Planning and Partnerships Division manages the Smart City Initiative, which advances solutions to civic challenges by engaging the community, City staff and the private sector to explore and implement emerging technology. It is built upon principles of equity, inclusion, transparency, resilience, innovation and community collaboration and founded on guiding principles that provide a framework for the City’s technology projects, goals and outcomes.

More information about the Smart City Initiative, including guiding principles, pilot programs and exciting new projects, is available on the Smart City Initiative webpage.

The full Technology Planning and Partnerships 2024 Year in Review Annual Report is available here.

About the City of Long Beach
Long Beach is nestled along the Southern California coast and home to approximately 466,000 people. As an award-winning full-service charter city, Long Beach offers the amenities of a metropolitan city while maintaining a strong sense of individual and diverse neighborhoods, culture, and community. With a bustling downtown and over six miles of scenic beaches, Long Beach is a renowned tourist and business destination and home to the iconic Queen Mary, nationally recognized Aquarium of the Pacific and Long Beach Airport, award-winning Long Beach Convention and Entertainment Center and world-class Port of Long Beach.

For more information about the City of Long Beach, visit longbeach.gov/. Follow us on social to keep up with the latest news: Facebook, X, Instagram and YouTube. To learn more about Technology and Innovation, visit: longbeach.gov/ti.