Town of Carmel Adds A.I. Assistant to Website

MAHOPAC, N.Y. — If Stanley Kowalski took a streetcar named Desire to the town of Carmel in search of information, there’s no question where he’d turn: to Stella, a new artificial intelligence (AI) assistant that’s getting a trial run on the town website.

Stella allows visitors to type in questions to navigate the town’s website , find the right contacts for various forms and permits, and more. According to Stella founder and CEO Ryan Endacott, artificial intelligence has “immense” potential in “revolutionizing municipal services.”

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The AI works much like the chatbots frequently seen on commercial websites but was designed specifically for municipalities. A dialog box appears on every page of the town’s website and invites visitors to ask a question, then provides an answer in text form.

The technology is currently being used under a two-month free trial that began on July 1. After the trial period ends, the town will look at the data to determine whether to pay for a full version.

Supervisor Mike Cazzari said town officials learned about Stella through the New York State Association of Towns, which uses the technology on its website. Since its launch in Carmel this summer, Cazzari said the technology has already been used hundreds of times by visitors to the town’s website.

“We had 214 inquiries last month in Stella,” Cazzari said. “We are approving the pilot as an annual contract at the August meeting. The functionality improves with use and there are suggestions from the developers that could be beneficial to us—like a suggestion box and allowing Stella to ask questions of the users like ‘What do you think of the master plan?’ or ‘How would you improve recreation programs?’”

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Carmel officials said the basic version costs $49 a month, the pro edition $199 a month, and the enterprise level is $999 a month.

“Based on our analytics and usage, the pro-level edition is most in line with our usage and needs, “ Cazzari said. “However, we will need to wait for confirmation and resolution by the town board.”

Councilman Robert Kearns said the technology is part of an overall plan to update the town’s website and will help town officials study what residents need.

“[The technology] allows us to review the analytics from how many users, to the types of questions our community members are asking most frequently,” Kearns said. “We will determine which edition of the program to continue after the period ends.”

The AI—which is multilingual—is designed to make it easier for residents to access town services.

“It will allow for easier communication with our website,” Kearns said. “We know the site needs to be updated, which is why we implemented Stella to help navigate the site and find things easier.

“It also works in other languages which helps our community,” Kearns added. “Last town board meeting we passed a resolution to update our site through our current provider, Civic Plus. In the meantime, Stella will act as a segue to a brighter and more current site.

Kearns said the overall website update will take about six months.

“In the meantime, we will utilize Stella to help navigate the site and provide as much information as it can,” he said. In addition to being multilingual, Kearns listed Stella’s “ability to ask questions and be taken directly to the site page and source” among its strengths.

“Limitations revolve more around those of the current town site,” Kearns said. “Our site needed to be brought into the 21st century to help stay connected with the community. Stella works by reading and understanding everything about the website it’s hosted on. The new site combined with Stella will create a great website that stands on transparency and efficient navigation.

Stella works by answering questions and, based on this author’s experiences, does a pretty good job of sorting the silly/rude queries from the more serious ones. The answers are basic and generally direct users to a specific contact or department. A query about building permits, for example, brought up the contact info for building inspector Michael Carnazza with his email address, phone number, and a link to town clerk Alice Daly’s webpage. A query about the cost of beach passes offered less specific information but did include the Recreation and Parks Department phone number.

“Try to be specific, so Stella can understand and provide the most accurate information,” Kearns said.

The technology does not require any personal information to use it and does not track IPS addresses, but does provide information on the types of questions people are asking.

“It has analytic tools that [place the data] into a pie chart for different categories to show the percentage of frequently asked questions and what our residents want to know most about,” Kearns said.

Kearns said town officials look at how Stella answers questions weekly to fine-tune the program.

“We review it every Monday to make sure Stella answered correctly and to also improve the end users experience,” he said.

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