In an interview with Rochelle Haynes, Managing Director at Bloomberg Philanthropies What Works Cities at Results for America at The AI Summit New York 2025, we explore how city governments are rethinking social impact and are adopting data and evidence-based practices to improve services. She highlights the importance of transparency and collaboration in addressing community needs, with a focus on:

• The is the role of cross-sector partnerships in solving challenges?
• How cities can engage communities effectively
• The role of leadership in driving innovation

Interview:

My name is Rochelle Haynes. I'm the managing director of Bloomberg Philanthropies, What Works Cities. In this role, I have the pleasure of working with over 200 cities in North, Central and South America on how to build strong data and evidence-based practices. 

What does that mean?

It's not just about how I help those cities think about their assets, but also think about the areas where they have gaps and help them be able to fill those gaps by providing free technical assistance, resources in a wonderful peer network that helps them think about what are the best ways to approach issues that they're challenged with.

How do we create an environment where cities can learn from one another? 

Driving Social Impact with New Technologies 

City government has an opportunity to revolutionize how they actually show up and operate and deliver services for residents. What I love about the conversation we're having now around AI is everyone actually is talking about the community. And not only are you, how are you letting your community know that you're using AI technology for government services, but also thinking about is there an AI tool or technology that can support a community level need? And so the communities that are developing technology that's connecting, are the ones that are having those conversations with their residents. They're getting their residents feedback from the beginning. 

One example I highlight is San Jose, which is we all know at the forefront of the AI revolution. They rolled out a translation tool and they thought the tool was great. They got resident feedback, it was actually culturally insensitive and giving responses that were inaccurate. And the city didn't run away from that. They embraced the fact that, okay, we didn't get it right, and started to have workshops with their community residents and hear from them what would be the best way to respond to this? And then they incorporate those changes in the next version of the translation tool. And so to me, when I think about AI and I think about community-centered technology, it's about how are you engaging your residents in the conversation, being transparent, being open, and being also willing to pivot to make sure that what you're deploying actually connects and is useful to your residents. 

Watching this government and innovation field transform has now led residents to expect to be engaged. Gone are the days where residents think that you just can deploy something as a city government, and they're just gonna say, okay, this is how it works. Residents expect now.  They also know they can leverage that open data portal and take a look and see how government services are responding. And I think that's shifted the conversation, and so now residents expect to be engaged. 

I also feel that cities have gotten more comfortable with transparency and accountability and recognizing that it's not a 'gotcha' moment, it's actually a moment to engage and make services better, which is what brings everyone to the work. 

Cross-sector partnerships

I think the best cross-sector partnerships start with a common goal. And so for cities, it's being able to identify what are you challenged by, and who are the best stakeholders in your community that can help you with that challenge. Whether it is an academic institution, whether it's a private sector department that you need, whether it's a community based organization. 

For example, in Recide Brazil, they were having issues with flooding and that flooding was impacting vulnerable communities the most. And so they partnered with a private sector technology company to say, wait a minute, there might be a solution here, particularly in AI driven solution, to be able to identify and help us better predict floods. And so that's an example of where a city had a challenge, they wanted to address their resident needs and were able to say, hey, let's partner together to solve this common issue. And so now they actually have flood detection sensors, they use those sensor to be able to predict when floods are gonna happen. They're able to let their residents know in advance, they can evacuate those residents sooner rather than later. And so you're saving lives and you're having quicker emergency response. That's one example of where when you partner a need in a community with a private sector company that also is trying to do good with new advanced technology to solve a common problem.

Engaging communities

When cities wanna work on engaging communities, the first thing is you have to do it thoughtfully and intentionally. Residents in the community should be at the forefront of any strategy that you're creating and being able to have resident voices upfront before it's fully designed. And so one of our cities, I love what they do, it's Port St. Lucie, Florida, for their strategic plan they actually hold an open block party. They have food, they have games, folks can bring their kids. But what they do is they have these life-sized poster boards of their actual strategic plan, and they ask the residents to walk through and leave sticky notes and leave ideas. And so it's a really thoughtful way to get that qualitative data from their residents. And then what they do is they actually incorporate that data into their final strategic plan. So really thinking about, are we as a city meeting the needs of our residents? Are the priorities that we think are important? Are they the same as our residents? And of more often than not a lot of times new issues emerge because you're now kind of democratizing how people can engage with you and going to them versus expecting residents to come to you, which is really important when you think about thoughtful community engagement. 

Leadership

Leadership is everything. This is not just about technology. This is about leaders who understand the needs of their community, the needs of government operations, and are saying, how do I thoughtfully build a culture that is data driven, that focus on governance, transparency, and accountability. And so the leaders that stand out in our network are the ones who come into office with that frame of mind and build that culture for their teams. And so they're not just saying data's important, they're leveraging data internally to guide their decisions on priority. They're also leveraging data with their residents to be able to meet the needs and fill gaps. 

What I admire the most right now about our leaders, particularly city leaders, is they're leaning in. Leaders understand that they don't wanna be left behind this time. And so they understand for them to get their cities and the places that they want it to be, for there to have government operations that actually serve people, they have to lead what this design of the future will look like, and design the cities of the future. And technology is a tool in that. But any of your plans live or die with the leadership that you have in place and their ability to execute on that.

Key Takeaways:

• Transparent and data-driven practices are transforming city governance.
• Cross-sector partnerships can address complex challenges like disaster management.
• Thoughtful community engagement ensures that city initiatives align with resident needs.

About Rochelle Haynes:

Rochelle Haynes is a seasoned leader with a multi-sector career dedicated to breaking the cycle of poverty in vulnerable communities. With extensive experience across government, nonprofit, and philanthropic sectors, she specializes in anti-poverty programs that support individuals, families, and children from birth through adulthood. Before joining Results for America to lead Bloomberg Philanthropies’ What Works Cities initiative, Rochelle spent over a decade working in NYC local government. She also served as Vice President of the U.S. Social Impact team at Sesame Workshop, where she spearheaded the scaling strategy for the Sesame Street in Communities initiative, and led global operations and strategy for the City Practice Management team at 100 Resilient Cities, a Rockefeller Foundation initiative. Currently, Rochelle works as an independent social impact consultant, focusing on policies and programs that promote economic mobility and address poverty across all stages of life.

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