▶ 0:03:15The title of today's hearing is the future of constituent engagement with congress. I note that a quorum is present. Without objection, the chair may declare a recess at any time. Also, without objection, the hearing record will remain open for five legislative days so that members may submit any materials they wish to be included therein.
▶ 0:03:35At the beginning of the 119th congress, we decided to update the subcommittee's name to the subcommittee on modernization and innovation, the behind the scenes work of closing out recommendations made by the select committee on modernization continues. But we also need to look forward and determine how we can ensure that house technologies and systems continue to evolve.
▶ 0:04:04Instead of getting copilot intoe house community is a great example of how the subcommittee is leaning into this work. For the past couple of months, we've worked closely with the ceo on a comprehensive plan to provide copilot licenses and targeted training to our house staff.
▶ 0:04:22As of today, 150 member offices have licenses, and in january, licenses will be available to every member, committee, leadership and house support office. Integrating ai technologies into house operations is really a game changing first step in making the house a more efficient and effective institution. Constituent engagement. The topic of today's hearing is another area that's ripe for innovation.
▶ 0:04:52There are all kinds of innovative tools and technologies that we could be using right now, rather than scrambling to play catch up later, communicating with our constituents is absolutely essential for doing our jobs. The jobs we were elected to do, assisting with casework, responding to questions, and explaining our positions on the issues of the day requires interacting with our constituents in effective and meaningful ways.
▶ 0:05:20But as we all know, the communications landscape is evolving at a rapid pace, and there are now many different ways to engage and share information. Our constituents are exposed to new technologies daily, whether they're scheduling appointments, ordering food, or using ai tools at work. The forms of communication they encounter outside of congress are much less common inside of congress.
▶ 0:05:49Rather than assume that they'll read our letters and emails, we should figure out how to meet our constituents where they're at today, tomorrow, and into the future. If we don't begin to incorporate new and emerging technologies and platforms into our constituent outreach strategies, we risk losing the ability to effectively connect with the people we need to hear from the most.
▶ 0:06:13For decades, the house has relied on a small number of constituent management systems, or cms, for handling members constituent engagement and outreach needs. While these systems have added different features and upgrades over time, I don't think that any of us would call these systems cutting edge.
▶ 0:06:31That's not at all a criticism as much as it is, as it is a reflection of the fact that the market here is limited, and it lacks the kind of competition that is typically needed to spark innovation. All of this presents us with a real opportunity to reimagine constituent engagement. Members represent vastly different districts and constituencies, so maybe a, quote, build your own system makes more sense than a one size fits all.
▶ 0:07:01That way, members could choose technologies and platforms that best meet the needs of their districts and constituents. More options could encourage real innovation, and that's really what we want. I'm looking forward to learning more about public views on the current and future states of constituent engagement, as well as what other countries and states are doing that is innovative and effective.
▶ 0:07:25The discussion today will help inform the subcommittee's exploration of how the house can improve, can innovate to improve how we connect with all of the people that we represent. I would now like to recognize ranking member torres for the purpose of providing an opening statement.
▶ 0:07:46>> good morning, everyone, and thank you, chairwoman bice, and thank you so much to our distinguished witnesses for taking the time, um, to share your insights with us today. I'm glad to be here working together with my colleagues on these and experts on the most fundamental goals of an elected representative. How can we listen to our constituents, and how can we build the trust that we need with them?
▶ 0:08:15I worry that faith in government is broken. Uh, we know that too many people feel like their government fails them. We just simply don't listen to them that they don't hear from us. Um, they don't we don't understand their complicated lives. And that whatever we do doesn't help with their them, with their challenges. When they do reach out to us, they feel will they feel heard.
▶ 0:08:45I'm not sure that that, um, is a true statement. Um, and I think that at least the constituents in my district want to feel that, uh, there is a human on the other side representing them.
▶ 0:09:02I represent a district about an hour east of los angeles, where latinos make up more than two thirds of the population at a time when americans need to be able to connect with their elected representatives in a straightforward, efficient way. The disconnect between washington and my constituents in the inland empire can often feel as an uncrossable divide.
▶ 0:09:32This hearing is an opportunity to confront the reality of record low trust in government and determine how congress can improve its approach to constituent engagement through modernization and innovation. What I do believe is that we need to meet people where they are. The goal is to create systems that make it easier for people to be heard. We need tools to better listen, to better hear the american people, and to better serve them.
▶ 0:10:01But I must say very loud and clear that a faster system that still excludes people isn't progress. We need to design tools that are accessible, transparent and responsible, uh, to the lived experiences of our constituents. These new methods of engagement must also protect constituents privacy and personal information when necessary.
▶ 0:10:31If congress is serious about strengthening democracy and encouraging civic participation, we must build the tools that don't just work on paper in washington, but they actually work in our communities. These tools need to work in practice for every american who needs to be heard. Because when a constituent finally takes that step to reach out to their government, that moment matters.
▶ 0:11:02And how we respond may determine whether they ever try again. A good example of a broken system. And that is not just here in congress this year. Um, as of august of this year, we had returned over $23 million to our constituents. So we can say congratulations to my office, to my employees, to the caseworkers.
▶ 0:11:32But I want to look at it as a failure of agencies that have failed to respond in in a timely manner, in a respectful manner, and have failed to truly hear the needs of that constituent, shouldn't take a member of congress to have to play, uh, lobbyists for our constituents if they deserve, um, certain benefits, they should get them.
▶ 0:12:01So a system that can help me deliver even more money to my constituents is what I am here for. So I'm going to turn it back to our chairwoman. And I look forward to listening to the conversation today. >> thank you.
▶ 0:12:16Ranking member torres, our first witness is doctor michael niblo, director of the ohio state university institute for democratic engagement and accountability idea, an alumni endowed professor at I'm sorry, at ohio state university. I have oklahoma state university on the brain. I just graduated a child from there on saturday. So my apologies.
▶ 0:12:37At ohio state university, doctor niblo has designed deliberative town halls for the us congress, the chilean constitutional convention, and the australian, nigerian and uk legislatures. He has further projects planned for malawi, korea and the european parliament and commission. Our next witness is miss aubrey wilson. Aubrey is director of global initiatives for the nonpartisan, nonprofit organization popvox foundation.
▶ 0:13:06In this role, she leads the digital parliaments project, which is focused on directly assisting legislatures around the world in adopting technology to improve operations, transparency and continuity. In recent years, this work has had a heavy emphasis on ai, leading aubrey to present ai training to parliamentarians around the world. Prior to joining popvox, aubrey served as the deputy staff director and director of oversight and modernization for the committee on house administration. Welcome back.
▶ 0:13:36Our next witness is doctor beth novak. Doctor novak is the chief ai strategist for the state of new jersey and the founder of innovate us, which delivers free ai training to states and cities across the united states. Her newest book is reboot the race to save democracy with ai. That will appear with the yellow press this summer. And our final witness is ken ward, senior director of house digital services.
▶ 0:14:02Drawing from his hill experience and computer science degree from georgetown university, Mr. ward founded fireside 21 in 2007. He led the company for over a decade as it deployed a broad scope of constituent products still used by house offices today. Mr. ward returned to the hill in 2020, and has since led a team of technologists to deliver high impact technology products for the house community. Welcome. We're glad to have you.
▶ 0:14:31Thank you to the panel of witnesses for all being with us today. Please remember to press the button on the microphone in front of you so that the green light is on, and when you begin to speak, the timer in front of you will turn green and after four minutes it will turn yellow. When the light red light comes on, your five minutes have expired and we would ask you to please kindly wrap up this time. I now recognize doctor niblo for five minutes.
▶ 0:15:01>> chairwoman. Vice ranking member torres, members of the committee, thank you for inviting me to speak. Today. Our founders famously established a republic. Fearing direct democracy would lose sight of the common good. Less famously, they feared that if government were to indirect, congress would lose touch with the common people. So they proposed capping the number of residents per district. Instead, congress capped the number of districts. Americans today believe congress has lost touch.
▶ 0:15:29But you represent 280 times the founders limit. How could you stay in touch? This hearing turns that rhetorical question into a real question. How could future engagement help you stay in touch? How can technology help reconnect congress to constituents? We partnered with this committee and the house digital services on a survey of 1000 citizens to find answers. At best, only 1 in 5 contacted contacted their member last year. What about the other four?
▶ 0:15:58Their silence doesn't mean they're satisfied because only 13% trust congress to do what's right. So they are they apathetic? No. The vast majority are frustrated. They're frustrated because they believe congress doesn't care what people like them think, and only listens to organized interests and party activists so they see no reason to engage. We've worked with enough offices to know members care very much as average citizens withdraw. However, only organized interests and party activists remain to tell congress what they want.
▶ 0:16:27We fallen into a self-reinforcing cycle. But there's good news governments around the world have used new approaches and technology to engage citizens in meaningful, two way communication. We could easily adapt them, and citizens are eager to try. Unlike apathy, frustration creates energy for change. Only 9% of our survey respondents said they wouldn't be willing to engage if they were invited to what they thought was an authentic and consequential forum.
▶ 0:16:55Our research shows that's not cheap talk. When we invite ordinary constituents to online deliberative town halls, previously disengaged citizens prepare, show up and contribute more than those who already call your office. They find the forums so transformative that 94% say they're, quote, very valuable for our democracy, and they want to participate in more. Think about that.
▶ 0:17:17In an era when only 13% of citizens trust congress, you can create spaces where 94% of citizens say the experience is so worthwhile, they do it again. That 81% gap tells us everything about what's possible. Participating members and staff have also found the forums valuable, but simply lack the time and resources for ongoing deliberation. Yet in our survey, citizens rated such forms as the most legitimate and effective way to communicate. Mass emails and social media scored lower.
▶ 0:17:46And at the bottom, 80% of citizens told us that ai chatbots were not acceptable for matters of substance. This finding is crucial. Ai can transform how staff manage the deluge of routine requests. And it is a deluge. But unless we use the freed up time the right way, ai won't dent the core problem. A customer service model makes sense for many important constituent service tasks scheduling capital tours, tallying issue sentiments from correspondents, etc.
▶ 0:18:14But think about what customer service implies about representative government. You own the company. Citizens can take or leave what you're selling. An office could have stellar customer service, and constituents will still find that problematic. Lobbyists might be clients of congress, but citizens want to be partners in self-government, and I know that most members want to be such partners to engagement that treats them like partners produces lasting gains in their knowledge, political knowledge, trust, voting rights, civility, and willingness to work together.
▶ 0:18:45These patterns hold informs. With over 7000 citizens, Mr. kilmer and Mr. timmons. National forum, with the predecessor to this committee, rolled back 38 years worth of rising partizan animosity, the largest decline in polarization ever documented. Citizens also reward and encourage legislative expertise in collegiality in these formats.
▶ 0:19:07We've had similar success with official forums as part of the chilean constitutional convention, the good friday accords in northern ireland, and many others, with several more projects planned. Citizens are so frustrated with representative democracy that they're prepared to work around it through referenda and the like, and an alarming number are now willing to consider alternatives to democracy itself. But like our founders, the vast majority would rather work with and through their representatives.
▶ 0:19:36That is, if we reimagine what that entails. I'm so grateful for this opportunity to testify, because I believe the future of american democracy depends much more than we realize on the future of constituent engagement. The technology exists, the models are proven. Your constituents are ready and waiting if you're ready to meet them. I know that all of us on this panel stand ready to help you do that. Thank you very much. >> thank you. Thank you. Doctor.
▶ 0:20:07>> I now recognize miss wilson for five minutes. >> chairwoman, vice ranking member torres and members of the subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to be part of today's hearing. I'm aubrey wilson, director of global initiatives at popvox foundation. And as previously stated, a former house staffer who had the immense pleasure of working for the committee on house administration during 117th and 18th congresses at popvox. Our mission is to help democratic institutions keep pace in a rapidly changing world.
▶ 0:20:34The majority of our team are prior congressional staffers, but our love for legislative institutions has expanded, leading us to work directly with parliaments around the world to transform their internal operations, helping them leapfrog from paper to cutting edge. Over the last two years, much of our work has focused on legislatures adoption of ai, specifically as it relates to improving internal operations. I've been asked to share international examples of how emerging technologies improving constituent engagement in ways that could benefit congress. Chatbots represent one of the lowest hanging fruit.
▶ 0:21:03They are familiar to users, quickly deployable and capable of providing 24/7 assistance regardless of user's age, language, or education level. Estonia has developed two ai legislative assistants for mps and staff that search through parliamentary legislative databases to find information about current laws, legislative proposals and amendments. While not currently public facing, these chatbots are a model for how constituents might one day be able to interact with data on congress.gov to understand which bills have been introduced and how those laws may affect them.
▶ 0:21:33Estonia has also launched a public facing chat interface, through which citizens are able to access services across 18 agencies. Through this one point of service, they can file consumer complaints, apply for permits, renew id cards, report car accidents, and even borrow library books. This vision of constituent engagement transcends the legislative branch by imagining government as an integrated service provider that could support individuals in navigating our complex ecosystem of federal agencies in any language, at any time.
▶ 0:22:01Beyond streamlining, access to information is enabling two way interaction. Brazil's ulysses suite empowers constituents to leave detailed remarks about legislation via online poll. Ai then groups and analyzes this broad public input and presents it back to policymakers, giving constituents meaningful participation while equipping legislators with actual, actionable insights. Ai can also foster quality constituent interactions at scale.
▶ 0:22:25In 2024, remesh, which is a us based company, facilitated an ai assisted community dialog between the major social groups in gaza. The insights from this were aggregated into informative data for international negotiators and in the ongoing peace process. These examples, along with the additional ones included in my written testimony, show what is possible. They also demonstrate that legislatures do not have to accept the all too common public perception that they are slow to innovate.
▶ 0:22:51With 441 lawmakers with diverse backgrounds and expertise, the house is already witnessing the deployment of technology in new ways by members and staff to engage with their constituents. The congressional hackathon house digital service modernization initiatives account and congressional data task force exemplify the resources available that institutionalize innovation. The house has all the inspirational components it needs, but it must go beyond one off initiatives by adopting a new way of doing things that allows ongoing experimentation, learning, and refinement.
▶ 0:23:20As the subcommittee evaluates next steps for institutional modernization, we encourage you to partner with the cao to reform, house it procurement, and introduce transparency. While few tools are built specifically for legislative use, a vibrant marketplace of tools that can be used in congress exists. And as other institutions share open source models, the selection of customizable legislative tools will also expand. Members who identify promising tools need a clear pathway for institutional approval. This subcommittee, in partnership with the cao, has a wide spectrum of potential approaches to support responsible innovation.
▶ 0:23:50For instance, the subcommittee can support the cao in exploring new contracting vehicles. It can work with cao to establish rapid pilot authorities and provide guardrails on low risk, no or low code experiments. It can champion innovative projects like house digital services, amazing data lake and innovation sandboxes, where members can test new tools before institution wide deployment together. Additionally, the subcommittee and cao must prioritize the establishment of robust but expedient cybersecurity review processes.
▶ 0:24:18A one year authorization timelines for new tools is incompatible with two year election cycles. Finally, building off of catherine szpindor legacy, the next cao needs to be ready to work hand in hand with this subcommittee to usher in the next era of innovation by identifying actionable solutions that empower members to pilot, experiment, and reimagine how new tools can serve constituents around the world. Legislatures are experimenting with emerging technologies, deploying new tools, and learning from each other about new approaches to the future of constituent engagement.
▶ 0:24:46The house can benefit from this innovation, but only when it has adopted the internal processes to institutionalize new ways of doing things. Thank you for being leaders in this conversation, and I look forward to your questions. >> thank you. >> miss wilson. I now recognize doctor beth novak for five minutes. >> there we go. Good. Um, chairwoman, vice ranking member torres, members of the subcommittee.
▶ 0:25:15Thank you for the opportunity to testify today. It is precisely at this moment when congress is most overworked, when the issues are getting ever more complex. The committee staff are roughly 40% smaller than they were in 1980, when the support agencies crs and gao and cbo, they've shrunk 45% in the last generation. Public engagement at this point really can sound like an unreasonable burden.
▶ 0:25:42Frankly, it's hard enough to field more than 81 million calls coming into congress every year from constituents historically. Let's be realistic. Meaningful participation has been too expensive. It's been too time consuming, and it's really lack the structures that has made public contributions useful for institutions. The web has made it easier for everybody to talk, but that doesn't mean it's made it easier for our institutions, in our democracy to listen.
▶ 0:26:12But in the state of new jersey, what we've learned is that pairing the right artificial intelligence tools today with a disciplined process, with the right design, can actually make it possible for government institutions, both to serve residents better, to deliver services, but also to listen and to govern not only faster and more efficiently, but also more inclusively, even at scale.
▶ 0:26:38And there are two recommendations that are outstanding, 176 and 174 from this subcommittee that provide a practical starting point for what we might do and for that transformation. So 176 calls for exploring ways to solicit public input for committee hearings long before generative ai. Brazil's senate, larger than our own, began inviting residents to submit questions for committee hearings, both by phone and on the web.
▶ 0:27:02Today, the brazilian senate has been integrating ai tools that are helping staff de-duplicate comments, cluster similar questions, and highlight those that directly are relevant to a committee's oversight goals. Participation has been substantial 46,000 questions across 546 hearings in 23 and 69,000 questions across 440 hearings in 24.
▶ 0:27:30Public input has become so routine that the staff report to me that when they don't get it in fast enough, the senators call them and say, where's my list of questions? This subcommittee could begin testing recommendation 176 through a simple, low risk pilot conducted over the course of a few hearings that invite the public to submit questions. But look, until recently, the idea of putting up an open text box on the web and say, comment here.
▶ 0:27:58This was really an impractical idea, but ai now makes it straightforward to gather that feedback not just by text, but by voice, to remove duplicates, to filter off topic comments, to cluster questions into themes, and to synthesize learnings. I outlined the specifics of this process in the written remarks, but let me just add that my students, in a program we call ai for impact, that we teach through northeastern university and our community college system in new jersey.
▶ 0:28:25They are embedded full time with government partners. They just built a tool, a free open source tool called open feedback, which is being deployed at scale by the city of boston. Residents can submit feedback in natural language, and the ai assistant responds with clarifying questions to improve the submission. The tool allows staff to organize comments by topic, to analyze patterns, and to route issues to the right department for faster feedback.
▶ 0:28:52The next ai for impact co op starts cohort, excuse me, begins in january and we'd be happy to adapt this tool for your use and to be of use through innovate us, the free, nonpartisan, nonprofit, peer to peer training program that I founded where government professionals teach one another how to use ai, and where we've trained 150,000 people around the country now and using ai to serve the public.
▶ 0:29:16We're learning from jurisdictions around the country, from the engaged california project, from the bowling green engagement project, from work we've done in new jersey and around the world about how different jurisdictions are using ai to do engagement at scale. We're turning those learnings into a training, which we will be happy to provide on how to effectively use ai for public engagement.
▶ 0:29:39Of course, there are risks, and congress must guard against hallucinations by ensuring that we're using ai to sort and to organize and not to make decisions. The greater risk is, of course, that we engage in ineffective or performative engagement that's disconnected from real decision making.
▶ 0:29:55But these pilots create an opportunity, a practical and immediate way to tap the expertise and the lived and credentialed experience of the american public to strengthen lawmaking, to strengthen oversight, and to quote michael, we all stand at the ready to assist. Thank you. >> thank you, doctor novak. And just a bit of housekeeping. You probably heard the bells. House votes have been called.
▶ 0:30:21We will go ahead and finish opening statements along with the opening statement from ranking member morelli of the full committee. And then we will take a brief pause for members to go vote and then we will return. So at this time, I recognize, Mr. ward, you're recognized for five minutes. >> good morning. Thank you for inviting the chief administrative office to participate in today's hearing.
▶ 0:30:42I'm joined by our cao catherine szpindor, our chief information officer, jamie kratz, our chief digital officer, bob barrett, and our deputy chief information security officer, adi adeniji. Um, personally, I've spent my entire career in and around the legislative branch. I worked in a member office. I founded the citizen engagement software company fireside 21, and I served as ceo for ten, ceo for ten years. And I spent the last five years here at the ceo, ceo, and lead our house digital service.
▶ 0:31:10So I've had a front row seat to see how technology has changed and impacted member offices that are dominated by landlines and letters is certainly over, and today's citizens and advocacy groups are already leveraging ai to reach and influence congress. Here in the house, the ceo has been bringing new methodologies and technologies online human centered design practices, business automation, cloud integration, and responsible ai, just to name a few.
▶ 0:31:37These innovations bring new possibilities for our products and services, and today we are sharing a new vision to help members and their staff improve constituent engagement, while continuing to ensure the privacy and security of the sensitive data in the unique environment of the house. The nonpartizan cao plays the role of both innovator and host when it comes to innovation.
▶ 0:31:59As an innovator, we build and maintain custom applications like the communicating with congress api, dear colleague, system, house, cal, index, and quill and over the past several years, in large part because of this subcommittee and the previous select committee on modernization, the house has advanced constituent focus technology as well. We launched flat-track, which helps offices manage flag requests from constituents.
▶ 0:32:26And we're piloting case compass, an initiative to aggregate and analyze casework to help members better understand trends and conduct oversight of the executive branch. In her other role as host to innovation, the ceo facilitates access to commercial technologies like office productivity suites, photo and video editing software, collaboration tools, and correspondence management systems. The cms systems your offices use daily.
▶ 0:32:53The current contract structure for cms is designed so every member's constituent data resides within one of a few proprietary systems. And now this design is limiting our innovation because other vendors can't access your data to provide new or improved services. To be clear, we're not blaming cms vendors. They are all operating within the framework that the house is required for several decades. That ensures the protection of your data.
▶ 0:33:18However, with recent advancements in secure storage and computing technologies, the house can and should explore making changes that could spur members access to more innovation, most notably by changing the way constituent data is stored and accessed. As you know, we've proposed creating a secure, house controlled constituent data lake for each member that can be leveraged by multiple house and vendor applications if and as authorized by each member.
▶ 0:33:48In short, your constituent data would be hosted in a way that gives you control over who can securely access your office's data, and that shared access will allow you to pick from a variety of vendors offering a range of constituent engagement services. This concept will open the door to new technologies and greater interoperability with existing house applications. Just this past september, over 20 innovators pitched new congress specific applications at the congressional hackathon.
▶ 0:34:15Presenters shared tools that use ai to identify constituent sentiment, automate sorting, and show real time analytics. A data lake would help bring these new innovations to congress and provide opportunities to enhance numerous other internal applications. For example, you can imagine receiving a need, dear colleague, and that invitation to co-sponsor a new bill already having data from your citizens who support and oppose that bill. So we think our issue is not a lack of innovation. It's just an access to this innovation.
▶ 0:34:43Migrating to a house controlled data lake will require a multi-year investment. However, our iterative approach will not only validate ongoing investment but also deliver new capabilities along the way. New capabilities that will be available to all member offices without the need to switch your cms. If done correctly. Building a data platform that focuses on security, governance, users and constituents. The house will spur both internal and external innovation and constituent engagement.
▶ 0:35:11It's a future where members are more empowered with a wider range of options to best serve and interact with the american public. Again, thank you for today's invitation and happy to answer your questions. >> thank you, Mr. warden. Thank you to all the panelists for those opening statements. And at this time, I'm going to recognize ranking member of the full committee on house administration, Mr. morelli, for an opening statement. Mr. morelli. >> thank you. I will be very brief.
▶ 0:35:38Um, given that we have votes and I appreciate the witnesses for being here on a really important subject, and certainly to you, uh, madam chair, for your continued, uh, good work in helping to modernize congress and certainly to my friend, ranking member torres, as well, for your leadership, I do want to acknowledge catherine szpindor who's retiring, uh, in the next few days and thank her for her long service to the congress.
▶ 0:36:04We're very, very grateful and wish her the very best as she transitions to the next phase of her, uh, her life. And also just want to acknowledge mike carey, who keeps adding layers of clothing because it's so damn cold on that side of the room. And house administration committee ought to do something about it.
▶ 0:36:22But, um, but I and I, in a serious mode, I, I think of as I was thinking about this word in my head, how constituents engage with congress in and I'm sure there are many different buckets, but the four that I'm particularly interested in, one is just access to information about congress, what bills are happening, making it easy to access that. So it's not as bewildering as it may seem to people.
▶ 0:36:45The second is sort of the the interaction with members engaging us in terms of providing, uh, perspective on issues before the house, issues before the country, what they think we ought to be doing, and for us to be able to engage with constituents. So that interaction is very important. And then the last two are related. One is access to government services. How do people know how to connect, uh, with all the things that we offer, both federal, state, local and then the final, which is related and adjacent, but is access to community services.
▶ 0:37:14How do I know if I'm suddenly in crisis? How do I know to engage? And I think many times when we do constituent services, people reaching out because they're entering into a system that is is to them bewildering. And at a time when we have clearly lost the faith and confidence, the american people institutionally as government, um, that last those last two buckets may be in some ways the most important, uh, just because as people are in crisis or family members are in crisis, how do they engage? And I have some real thoughts on that.
▶ 0:37:43The the introduction of ai clearly is critical, and I'd love to learn more about it. I will admit, uh, many websites I go to where I'm doing a chatbot and it's clearly a chat assistance I find incredibly frustrating. I don't feel like I feel like I might as well read the frequently asked questions, because there's no other engagement other than the frequently asked questions being regurgitated to me. And that will get better.
▶ 0:38:09Um, but clearly, having humans engaged in this is going to be a big deal. And I appreciate all of what you have to say. And I'm looking forward to after votes coming back and engaging again. Madam chair, thanks for giving me the few words. >> thank you, ranking member morelli. And I want to, um, second, the comments that you made about catherine szpindor and her departure from the cao. We it's been a joy and pleasure working with the entire cao staff, but particularly katherine on these endeavors.
▶ 0:38:40And your presence will be noted, uh, as you depart for greener pastures, potentially. So, um, with that, we are going to, um, take a recess of the subcommittee and we'll return upon the conclusion of votes. >> thank you. Can you call. >> angela to see where, um. And andrea. >> to heat up to warm up space heater? Yeah, most people have.
▶ 0:39:12Yeah. We need one here for for witnesses. It's maybe meant to keep us on our. >> I'm all over the place. >> over here. No, it's fine, I just I feel bad, I don't.
▶ 1:06:21>> we will now move to questions for the witnesses, beginning with me, followed by the ranking member, torres, Mr. kerry and Mr. morelli. Each member will have five minutes to ask questions. So I ask to please keep your responses concise. Uh, I now recognize myself for the purpose of questioning the witnesses. First of all, thank you for the very insightful testimony.
▶ 1:06:42I think that we can agree that ai is certainly becoming, uh, a usable tool as we look to improve constituent engagement across the house. My first question, though, and this may be more for doctor novak or Mr.
▶ 1:06:58Ward, is how do you build a platform that would be useful, um, as an ai tool, for example, using a chatbot that could actually give responses that are going to be accurate and or make sense. Are you looking at building, um, some sort of customized llm to actually, uh, interact with, with the house website?
▶ 1:07:22But secondly, how could you, uh, ensure that the responses that are being given are going to be customized to each office? Because, for example, miss torres and I may have a different perspective on an issue. Um, can you talk a little bit about how you might do that? >> no red, no red light on my end. Um, so I thank you for the question.
▶ 1:07:48I think one of the things that we've done in new jersey, first of all, and that we've done through our work building tools for other states as well, is to start with internal facing chat bots. So I think it's really important to recognize that these tools are extremely good for synthesizing information. And that's what's made it possible to do things like train an ai tool on a specific corpus of documents. So that would mean a member could.
▶ 1:08:14And it's something, by the way, that together with popvox, the ai for impact program, built the first and tested the first chatbot for a member, where we loaded it with all of that member's position statements, bill drafts, etc. Um, and then the tools are getting much better at restricting responses only to what is on what is in that corpus of knowledge. So that's one way to avoid the hallucination problem number one. Number two, internal facing tools. So that what you're doing is giving staff a tool that they can use to quickly give answers to people.
▶ 1:08:43So in new jersey, for example, we're not using chatbots to answer constituent calls. You're not getting, uh, you know, a machine. What you're getting is a human who in turn has a good lookup tool on their end that's allowing them to synthesize a lot of information. So I think the best place to start is with those tools for the people answering the phone to make their jobs easier, but the tools are allowing us to get better, especially when you train them to restrict their answers to a specific corpus of knowledge.
▶ 1:09:10That's also what's allowed us in new jersey to bring down the time it takes to answer a call from 40 minutes to now, three minutes, and modernize all of our call centers using some of these practices. >> fantastic. >> would you like to add anything, Mr. ward? >> yeah, I would just echo that. I think we have a lot of opportunities here internally for those chatbots. So there's a use case where staff is trying to find house operational information that could be on house net. There's the data that is private to your office that could be a different chatbot.
▶ 1:09:37There's data in your cms that could be a separate chatbot. Um, and so it's just about structuring data the right way to enable those services. >> perfect. Thank you. Um, doctor, I'm going to pivot to you. Your testimony highlighted the mismatch between public frustration and congress's current engagement methods. What specific institutional reforms would help bridge this gap and make constituent input more actionable for members? >> thank you.
▶ 1:10:06Uh, that's that's a it's a great question. Um, at the institute, so far, we've had a relatively small set that we've implemented and have hard evidence on. And I try to follow a kind of political science hippocratic oath.
▶ 1:10:22Um, so I I'll, I'll separate a little bit between what I have firsthand, uh, you know, scientific evidence about and then, uh, some, some other ideas that that we don't have as much backing on, but deliberative town halls we have done. I forget how many now and none have gone badly. Um, uh, there's some. >> define gone badly. >> okay. Define. That's a great question. Um, in.
▶ 1:10:50No, in no case has a member not gained trust approval, um, voting rates, voting for the member rates. Now in some cases it's small. Uh, in other cases it's eye popping. Um, uh, so gone wrong would be the member stuck their neck out, tried something new, and it hurt them in the eyes of their constituents. That's how I would define it. That has not happened once. Um. >> how do you ensure with a particular platform that you're utilizing?
▶ 1:11:19Is it are you able to ensure that the individuals that you're connecting with are constituents of that particular member? >> yeah, that's one of the really nice things about doing the online town halls and doing them by invitation. I in principle, somebody that we give the invitation to and have the verified link could give it to somebody else, but not be on at the same time themselves. Right.
▶ 1:11:44So so there is a little shadow of a possibility once in a while, but we have reason to think that we're talking about tiny numbers. Maybe no one, uh, on that. Um, and uh, and the results are really quite large.
▶ 1:12:02Um, your predecessors on the select committee did a joint bipartisan town hall, and two weeks after it, uh, affective polarization, dislike of the party relative to the in party was as if 38 years ago, 38. I mean, over 100 studies have been published trying to lower affective polarization. This is the largest one and most of the other large ones. You can't talk about politics. We need to learn how to talk about politics. Right.
▶ 1:12:32>> thank you very much, doctor, I appreciate that. Um, I'll now recognize the ranking member, miss torres, for five minutes. >> um, thank you again. I'm really excited to hear more about this developing technology. Certainly. Um, you know, the in-person town halls have caused a lot of security concerns. They require law enforcement presence, security presence, not just for the member, but for the attendees.
▶ 1:13:02So to be able to have a conversation with constituents, for me, it's been, um, a lot more work because that means that we have to limit, um, information to maybe 120 people in a smaller setting, or we do a lot more round table discussions with 30, 40 people, um, versus doing a town hall that can bring in, you know, 400, 600 people. So I look forward to continuing to hear more about that.
▶ 1:13:32Uh, on the issue of securing, um, data, I think we you and I talked a little bit, um, Mr. ward, about, um, some of my concerns that I have, uh, we have a lot of casework that is open. Some of it is ten years old. It takes that long to get, um, some of the cases, uh, completed.
▶ 1:13:54I want to be able to when a constituent calls my office for anyone in the office to be able to respond to that constituent. So that constituent doesn't have to wait for the casework worker assigned to their individual case to get a response. You know, we're still researching your information. We're still waiting for the agency to reply to us.
▶ 1:14:21Uh, we can't check back in for another 3 or 4 days, but how do I ensure that anyone who answers the call in my office and anyone of my offices and many times their interns answering the phone, has some data available that they can immediately respond to that caller, but not be able to see specific data, such as the
▶ 1:14:51Social security or identifiable information for that constituent. >> okay. Well, um, a couple of things. I think, you know, with what we're proposing with one of the benefits of what we're proposing is be able to have governance that's specific to different parts of that data.
▶ 1:15:11And we're not certainly proposing taking all this data and putting it in a large language model, for example, um, but with a data lake, you can have different settings and different governance on different segments of data and sharing. Similarly, you know what people can see now that will require some integration with the service providers and make sure that there's, um, integration there, but that's very feasible. Um, there's also potential to have more self-service capabilities for citizens so they can go to a portal and access a status as.
▶ 1:15:43>> the constituent, correct themselves. Okay. Um, where they would be able to input their personal data. So the bot or the computer, the system knows that it's responding to the correct person. >> that's right. They would have to authenticate into the system. But you know, for example, with our flag track product, a little much different. But we are proposing expanding that so citizens can, you know, self-service, checking the status of those orders and something similar could exist for casework. >> right.
▶ 1:16:12So nearly 1 in 3 working americans have very little digital skills. Um, we learned the hard way about this when the va, uh, made a change, it requiring digital ids instead of, um, id cards.
▶ 1:16:29My office had created a system that we could go to any location and be able to, uh, get a constituent, a real id that they can carry in their pocket, that they can show for their benefits and, and other public benefits, public and private benefits that are available to them. Um, you know, we have to create systems that don't shut them out completely.
▶ 1:17:01So outside of going out and training our constituents on how to create a, um, a screen name or, you know, an email address, how do you propose that we, uh, jump through some of these hoops that are also challenges? Miss novak, you seem to really be involved in the constituency part of this have. >> rolled out a program that we call our civic ai training program.
▶ 1:17:30It works via whatsapp in multiple languages that was designed to teach people how, what ai is, but how to use it to engage and interact with government. So it is specifically for that purpose. And we designed it actually with families in california, in fact, as part of a program where we co-design together with those families tools, using ai to help understand their child's individualized education program.
▶ 1:17:54The document you get from government, the 100 page pdf you get about the services to which you're entitled when your child has a is differently abled. So, um, we believe that citizens are smart. They want to learn. They're capable of not just understanding what these tools are, but helping to build them. And so that's why we're rolling out via the mobile phone multilingual support in free in how to use ai to interact with. >> what is the program called? >> uh, sorry, civic ai. >> civic ai. Thank you. And I yield back. >> thank you. Ranking member.
▶ 1:18:25At this time, I recognize representative kerry for five minutes for questions. >> thank you. I want to thank the chair and the ranking member. Um, doctor, I'm going to start with you. Of course. Um, knowing where you're from, I have to start off with. Oh, alright. Um, we all know that the public trust in congress is much lower than we would like it to be, and that continues to be a cause of concern.
▶ 1:18:50But I was struck by the survey finding that 70% of respondents are willing to engage more directly with elected officials on important issues. Now, to me, that's a positive sign. Now, you mentioned deliberative town halls, and this is an effective form of two way engagement. Uh, at this time, could you talk maybe a little bit more how those might work? Sure. >> uh, thank you for the opportunity.
▶ 1:19:18Um, the the the real difference in there are a few differences in deliberative town halls. One of them, uh, is that as if we were doing a survey, um, we try to get a a real random sample of the entire constituency in affirmatively in personally invite them. Um, and it turns out that it can seem like there's a contradiction.
▶ 1:19:43Um, citizens saying they don't think members care what they think and yet, um, you know, they, they want to engage. Right. And, um, the distinction is that when the member affirmatively reaches out and says, no, really, I want to hear what you have to say. How does tuesday at seven sound? The the citizen says, oh, okay. They're one of the good ones. Um, it's very, very fragile, very, very easy to to get them to believe that you do care.
▶ 1:20:13And that's where the apathy, frustration difference is really important. So affirmatively inviting a very broad sample. And the broad sample also tremendously alters the dynamics. Your average constituent does not want to yell at you. Your average constituent hasn't even necessarily made up his or her mind on the issue. They're not there to necessarily give you a piece of their mind. They want to hear what you have to say before making up their mind, which is why this interactive dialog, um, is so valuable.
▶ 1:20:42Um, you get to hear from them about their concerns, their values, um, their questions, but they actually want to hear from you too. Right? Um, so we do a survey beforehand. Um, these are real field experiments. So there's also a control group that we survey people attend. And then there's a survey, usually about two weeks later, of everybody. Again, um, the forums are online, uh, on a secure platform.
▶ 1:21:09We're building a bespoke platform that's very, very easy to use. Um, we'll be linked to the 14 most spoken languages in the united states. Um, my grandfather was illiterate. So, you know, we have, um, oral, uh, versions. We have real time captioning for the hearing impaired. Um, uh, so we're very serious about trying to really any, any enfranchised citizen should be able to talk to their member of congress. Um. >> I appreciate that.
▶ 1:21:38I and I'm going to be cutting short on time here. Now, there is, of course, I mean, you've seen this. You've all seen this in the press. There's a real concern about member safety. Um, you know, I think that we and on this committee on house admin work very hard to increase the security budget, uh, of most of our members, um, like many members, we've had death threats.
▶ 1:22:02Um, and, uh, so we now have to have a security detail, which we never thought we'd have to have before. Um, in the two way communication forums, are there effective ways? And I know you only have a minute to take down the temperature, uh, from the onset of those forums. >> that's really one of the most extraordinary things that we found is that when you get a random sample, as I said, your average constituent does not want to yell at you.
▶ 1:22:30They don't want to throw bombs very quickly. We had a provision in the very first study we did with an nsf funded project, built these um, and if a question or comment was considered, um, abusive, inciting or vulgar, we had to pull it out. Over 1400 questions submitted in the first round that we did zero. Not once did we have to pull it out. That tells you the difference of the of the people who are the frequent fliers.
▶ 1:23:01And and some of them are great. They're active citizens. We've got to represent them too, or you have to represent them too. But the random sampling helps a lot. Online helps a lot. Moderation helps a lot. And they look around. Even people who might be inclined look around in their fellow citizens are being civil and behaving, or the members are treating each other with dignity. >> I'm sorry, doctor, I want to thank you for your time. Um, chair. With that, I yield back. >> thank you, Mr. kerry. And at this time, we do have time for a second round of questions.
▶ 1:23:29So I will recognize myself for an additional five minutes of questions. Uh, miss wilson, I want to direct this to you. You've worked with legislatures around the world. What? Lessons from global experiments with ai. Do you think that congress can uniquely position is uniquely positioned to maybe adopt? >> yes, sir. >> all right. Thank you so much for these questions.
▶ 1:23:51Um, I will start by saying that our our work with international legislatures has actually been extremely eye opening experience, especially as a congressional staffer. I think that I took for granted the incredibly robust it infrastructure and all of the benefits of that that this body has.
▶ 1:24:06And I think that that's in itself a lesson to learn from with a lot of the legislatures that we work with, the way that they're implementing ai is to rapidly modernize their internal processes in the practice of just digitizing documents, making data accessible, getting up to date websites, things that we really do take for granted, I think as a us congress. Um, but that really, I think, showcases that the fact that the us congress already has such a strong it foundation lets you kind of build on top of that.
▶ 1:24:32So while other countries are using ai to kind of build that foundation, we actually have the ability to experiment and to be the people who design the future of constituent engagement. And so, um, so I would say that that's kind of the first the first element, the second element is, is one of the biggest kind of, um, difference makers within with international institutions that have been able to kind of move more agilely is, is having internal processes that allow them to test and experiment and adopt new tools.
▶ 1:24:59And a lot of that comes back down to kind of your internal authorization and security protocols. And with that, um, having kind of a tiered system has really helped kind of expedite, um, the ability for, for new tools to be tested that are low risk and be more quickly adopted so that then they can be implemented and staff and members can start benefiting from them. >> that was an incredible segue into my next question to the panelists. So thank you for that. Um, there's a couple things that we think about when we're trying to launch new technology within the house.
▶ 1:25:26Um, specifically cybersecurity. It becomes a big topic of conversation. Um, I think that for the panel, I would say I would ask you all, um, you know, there are regular, rigorous standards to become a vendor for the house and some of the, um, individuals that want to partner with us may have their particular platform rejected for a variety of reasons. Um, so this is going to be a couple of maybe parts of a question.
▶ 1:25:56One, um, is there a way for us to speed up that approval process to are the individuals, the vendors that are wanting to partner with us? Are they able to know and learn why they may have been denied? And, um, what should we be thinking about as a committee to try to help improve the process and or the recruitment of vendors that potentially have innovative technologies that the house could be utilizing? So a lot, um, but I'll throw it open to anyone who wishes to answer.
▶ 1:26:29Mr. warden, doctor novak seemed to be looking at each other, so. >> everybody's looking at me. Okay. Um, well, so we have a number of different processes that depend a little bit on what the technology is. So for example, with cms, there's a specific process for that. And there's other processes for other cloud services. >> can I ask a question on that. How often is the process reviewed. Would you say. >> um, well, the cms contract is, you know, typically issued for like a six year term with option years, but every option period, every two year option period is reviewed.
▶ 1:26:57Um, the cloud approval process, we're always kind of looking at that's a house information security policy of the committee. And there's work underway. Now I think you're aware of, um, in collaboration with your staff to look at that. So, um, you mentioned two things that, um, I think will be will be realized in the new year, which is more information on house.gov for vendors, um, more information on house. Net for staff to understand those processes.
▶ 1:27:22Um, and what we propose with the cms modernization is a part of a larger puzzle of doing business with the house that we want to improve. >> doctor novak. >> so I'm happy to take offline the question of how we streamline that process in new jersey for making it faster for vendors. Let me just speak to the public engagement pilot idea. This is not something that needs to integrate with core systems, and therefore it should be something that is easy to try effectively tomorrow. >> so stand alone. >> sorry. >> so it's a standalone.
▶ 1:27:50>> one can do something in a sandbox environment that is a standalone that allows you to test processes while you work in parallel to figure out then how would you integrate technologies so it could stand alone. And because you're talking about public comments, not something that involves private information. And by the way, you can use ai to filter out any private information or social security numbers that someone does accidentally type in. That's something fairly easy to do. That would be something relatively quickly to stand up as a pilot, uh, without worrying about integration with back end systems. >> excellent.
▶ 1:28:20Um, I think that is the end of the questions that I have at the moment. Miss torres, would you like to recognize. >> thank you. Um, I just want to do a follow up. Uh, is six years too long to give someone an opportunity to improve their systems? Uh, how do we get feedback from the actual users?
▶ 1:28:46Are we constantly, um, requesting that input from the users so that we're improving systems or ensuring that, um, our vendors are meeting the moment or the contract? >> yeah, absolutely. And, um, I think that with this, what the ceo is doing is trying to be more and more engaged with staff and users of these services to constantly learn. And and what we're proposing is, is a response to that, to bring more options and more flexibility and more capability.
▶ 1:29:17>> yeah, I just want to ensure that we are constantly, um, asking for input from the users to ensure that we are, um, utilizing the best, um, applications out there for our needs. And everything that was said today sounds wonderful. We're really moving into a new digital world. Um, that would help us be a bit more responsive to our constituents.
▶ 1:29:48But all of that is only as good as the internet services that service our communities, uh, could withstand. And I can tell you that I chose the location of my district office to be directly across from an international airport thinking, you know, we we it would be a great place to have the best, um, wi-fi and the best internet services. Uh, in, in this suburb. Um, unfortunately, that is not the case.
▶ 1:30:16And, you know, we're constantly, um, having to deal with a 3 or 4 minute delay just to send an email from one from the dc office to the district office. So I just want to remind my colleagues that investing in the infrastructure across america, especially for, you know, to meet that, to close that digital divide is so critically important.
▶ 1:30:42Um, suburbs, uh, as well as, um, you know, states that are very rural, I think deserve to have an opportunity to also hear from their representatives. So with that, I yield back to the chair. Thank you. >> thank you, ranking member torres. And I want to thank the panelists for joining us for having this important conversation.
▶ 1:31:07I think you've given us a lot to think about as we are looking to continue to innovate, uh, within the house infrastructure and provide the best possible constituent engagement that we can, keeping in mind that technology changes rapidly. There are certain limitations and challenges that we have, including the cybersecurity piece of this. But there's a lot of innovation happening right now and incredible opportunity for us to be able to leverage and utilize that. Uh, because after all, this is the people's house.
▶ 1:31:34So, uh, with that, this subcommittee is adjourned.