This Month's Latest Tech News in West Palm Beach, FL - Sunday August 31st 2025 Edition

Weekly commentary: AI takes center stage in West Palm Beach - promise, jobs and questions. A proposed AI headquarters that is asking for $2M in grants and touting 856 high‑paying jobs (an average salary of $170,000) and $280M in projected economic impact has put the classic tradeoff into sharp relief: big potential gains for the local economy, but also pressure on public incentives and city services; read the coverage in the South Florida Business Journal: South Florida Business Journal coverage of proposed AI headquarters in West Palm Beach.

City tools like the CRA's incentive programs - from REDA to façade grants - are designed for deals like this and deserve close scrutiny on the West Palm Beach CRA incentive programs page: West Palm Beach CRA incentive programs and grants, especially as local agencies juggle recruitment shortfalls (the police department still lists vacancies) and questions about who benefits.

For residents and workers wanting practical AI skills to compete for these roles, Nucamp's AI Essentials for Work offers a hands‑on path into workplace AI; see the bootcamp registration and syllabus here: Nucamp AI Essentials for Work bootcamp - registration and syllabus (15-week workplace AI training), because policy debates matter, but so do ready, local talent pipelines.

Attribute	Information
Description	Gain practical AI skills for any workplace; learn AI tools, prompting, and apply AI across business functions.
Length	15 Weeks
Courses included	AI at Work: Foundations; Writing AI Prompts; Job Based Practical AI Skills
Cost	$3,582 early bird; $3,942 regular
Registration	Register for Nucamp AI Essentials for Work (15-week bootcamp)

1) West Palm Beach courts a ‘whale' AI/software firm for 10 City Place - city leaders are assembling up to $2 million in local grants and roughly $15 million in state incentives to lure a major California software company to a new downtown tower at 10 City Place, a project that could deliver about 1,000,000 square feet of office space and a workforce “the size of a small college” (potentially up to 4,700 people) by a 2027 target; the Palm Beach Post outlines the plan and partners involved - including Related Ross and the Business Development Board - while the South Florida Business Journal reports the company is seeking roughly 856 high‑paying roles that average about $170,000 a year, a deal that would reshape downtown demand for housing, transit and city services if it lands.

Read more in the Palm Beach Post and the South Florida Business Journal: Palm Beach Post coverage of West Palm Beach software company at 10 City Place and South Florida Business Journal report on AI company job incentives in West Palm Beach.

Attribute	Details
Location	10 City Place, CityPlace office tower
Incentives	Up to $2M (city grants); ~$15M (state incentives)
Size	About 1,000,000 sq ft
Potential occupancy	Up to 4,700 office workers
Jobs	More than 850 (reporting cites ~856)
Average salary	$170,000
Target occupancy	2027
Sources	Palm Beach Post coverage of West Palm Beach software company at 10 City Place; South Florida Business Journal report on AI company job incentives in West Palm Beach

“West Palm Beach has a proud tradition of welcoming innovation that enhances quality of life.” - Mayor Keith A. James

Ask Poli

chatbot and revamps Public Meetings Portal - In a bid to make town government easier to navigate, Palm Beach (population under 10,000) rolled out an AI-powered assistant called

Ask Poli

alongside a redesigned public meetings portal in a May 19 announcement; the chatbot - built in partnership with Polimorphic - uses natural‑language search to surface plain‑language answers and is designed to work 24/7 and in 75+ languages, promising fewer phone calls and faster access to meeting records and schedules.

Local officials framed the upgrades as a transparency and service win, but coverage notes the growing trend of municipal chatbots comes with tradeoffs - AI can return inaccurate results and may pose extra risks for people with disabilities unless safeguards or legislation are in place.

Read the town's rollout coverage in the Palm Beach Daily News and Polimorphic's take on the product for governments here: Palm Beach Daily News coverage of Ask Poli launch and Polimorphic article on Ask Poli government chatbot.

Attribute	Details
Launch	May 19 release; Ask Poli added to town website
Vendor	Polimorphic (Polimorphic AI chatbot product page)
Key features	Natural‑language search, 24/7 responses, multi‑language support (75+), redesigned public meetings portal
Concerns	Potential inaccuracies, accessibility risks for people with disabilities; calls for safeguards/legislation
Local framing	Town emphasizes transparency and improved resident access

3) Broadcasters push AI to new levels - live translations tested in West Palm Beach: Sinclair has begun a multi‑market experiment that uses generative AI to provide real‑time Spanish translations of local newscasts, and WPEC in West Palm Beach is one of four test stations where viewers can stream a live Spanish feed on the station's YouTube channel; the move, done in partnership with Deeptune, aims to break down language barriers for news, weather and community updates while building governance guardrails around provenance and misinformation.

Early work stretches back to 2024 - when Sinclair used AI for Tennis Channel dubbing and to reach broader audiences during Hurricane Milton - and the new test is framed as a way to make local journalism more accessible without adding broadcast staff.

Follow the rollout and technical details at TVNewsCheck and read the broader announcement and context at TVTechnology.

Station (market)	AI translation YouTube feed
WBFF (Baltimore)	WBFF Baltimore Spanish AI translation YouTube channel
KABB (San Antonio)	KABB San Antonio Spanish AI translation YouTube channel
WPEC (West Palm Beach)	WPEC West Palm Beach Spanish AI translation YouTube channel
KSNV (Las Vegas)	KSNV Las Vegas Spanish AI translation YouTube channel

“At Sinclair, we are committed to leveraging innovative technology to expand access to local journalism.” - Rob Weisbord, COO and president, Local Media

4) Regional incentive trend: AI firm seeks incentives to create 856 high‑paying jobs - A prospective AI headquarters is asking West Palm Beach for about $2 million in local grants to land a project that the South Florida Business Journal says would deliver 856 high‑paying roles (an average salary of $170,000) and roughly $280 million in projected economic impact; read the South Florida Business Journal coverage for the incentive details: South Florida Business Journal coverage of AI company incentives in West Palm Beach (Aug 29, 2025).

That scale makes incentives a regional debate, not just a municipal budget line: policymakers must weigh the short‑term boost in payroll against long‑term needs for housing, transit and training.

Scholarship on AI and labor suggests these deals hinge on workforce strategy - AI often reshapes tasks more than it simply destroys jobs - so local reskilling and talent pipelines will determine whether the payoff is broad or concentrated; see the broader labor framing in the EIG analysis:

“AI and Jobs: The Final Word” - EIG analysis of AI's labor market effects

Attribute	Details
Incentives requested	About $2,000,000 in local grants (per reporting)
Jobs	856 high‑paying positions
Average salary	$170,000
Projected economic impact	Approximately $280,000,000
Source	South Florida Business Journal coverage of AI company incentives (Aug 29, 2025)

5) ZenaTech acquires Wallace Surveying - Drone‑as‑a‑Service grows in West Palm Beach - ZenaTech has closed its purchase of West Palm Beach's Wallace Surveying, folding three decades of local land‑survey know‑how into a national DaaS roll‑up that brings ZenaDrone 1000 and the IQ series to regional projects; the company highlights that remotely piloted drones with LiDAR and high‑resolution sensors can capture expansive terrains in hours instead of weeks, speeding power‑line inspections, precision agriculture, surveying, law enforcement work and hurricane search‑and‑rescue.

By offering subscription and pay‑per‑use access, the DaaS model reduces upfront costs for governments, developers and farmers while scaling advanced drone sensors and AI analytics across legacy tasks - read the company announcement and market coverage for details: ZenaTech press release on Wallace Surveying acquisition and TipRanks coverage of the ZenaTech Wallace Surveying acquisition.

Attribute	Details
Announcement date	April 3, 2025
Buyer	ZenaTech, Inc. (ZENA)
Acquired	Wallace Surveying Corporation (West Palm Beach, FL)
DaaS products	ZenaDrone 1000; IQ series (IQ Nano, IQ Square)
Key services	Land surveying, power‑line inspections, precision agriculture, law enforcement, search & rescue
Benefits	Faster data capture (hours vs. weeks), reduced upfront costs, scalable subscription/pay‑per‑use model
Source	GlobeNewswire press release on ZenaTech acquisition

“Wallace Surveying Corporation is well respected in the South Florida business community with longstanding existing customer relationships. Its team brings considerable expertise toward our goal of innovating land surveys at scale leveraging advanced drone data collection, data management, mapping and digital deliverables. This acquisition is another step towards our vision to create a national DaaS business, bringing AI drone efficiencies and precision to a variety of legacy verticals and manual tasks.” - Shaun Passley, Ph.D., CEO

6) BEACON AI weather alert system expanding to West Palm Beach region - As hurricane season ramps up, Florida's new AI-driven Broadcast Emergency Alerts and Communications Operations Network (BEACON) is coming to Palm Beach County to add a persistent, multilingual safety channel that “voices alerts” over local radio and a mobile app even when power or networks fail; the system's always-on text-to-speech platform automates repeated, official messages across radio, streaming and apps to reduce missed warnings, and it's set to expand from Gainesville into West Palm Beach, Boca Raton, Naples and Fort Lauderdale within months, backed by the Florida Division of Emergency Management and University of Florida partners.

Residents should consider signing up for the redundant channels BEACON offers - an alert read over a local FM frequency can reach a family sheltering in a darkened garage when phones go silent.

Read more on WFLX's local news coverage (WFLX local news: BEACON coverage) and BEACON's signup and technical details (BEACON emergency alerts: signup and technical information).

Attribute	Details
System	BEACON (Broadcast Emergency Alerts and Communications Operations Network)
Key features	AI-driven text-to-speech, multilingual broadcasts, 24/7 radio channel, operates during outages
Delivery channels	Local AM/FM radio, mobile app (Beacon 24/7), streaming
Partners	Florida Division of Emergency Management, University of Florida, Futuri Media
Status	Live in Gainesville; launching soon in West Palm Beach, Boca Raton, Naples, Fort Lauderdale

“BEACON is a really unique and innovative tool that's designed to work for, and with, the official government agencies that actually do the alerting” - Dr. Randy Wright, University of Florida

The new Palm Beach Real Time Crime Center, launched in May and funded in part by the Fire Foundation's recent $1.2M camera drive, stitches together island surveillance, traffic cams and officers' body‑worn footage into a single operations hub that detectives can use to preview scenes before patrols arrive - a capability local reporters say has already cut response times and shortened investigations.

Inside the downtown tech room a wall of monitors streams live feeds and, when officers turn on lights, bodycam video pops onto the screens, letting headquarters guide traffic stops, flag hazards and speed search efforts; the Daily News' on‑the‑ground reporting describes detectives supplying real‑time intelligence to officers at a traffic stop from the 345 S. County Road hub.

That speed and precision, plus the department's adoption of underwater drones for search‑and‑rescue, underscore a clear pay‑off for public safety, but the concentration of live surveillance power also raises questions about oversight, transparency and how footage is governed - worth watching as the town balances safety gains with civil‑liberties concerns (read the local coverage from WPBF and the Palm Beach Daily News for details).

“The Real Time Crime Center gives officers an extra set of eyes on the streets before they even arrive.” - WPBF coverage of the Palm Beach Police Real Time Crime Center (WPBF report on Palm Beach Real Time Crime Center)

8) AI surveillance in schools: false alarms, harms and local examples - Districts increasingly deploy AI-driven monitors like Gaggle and Lightspeed Alert to scan student chats and files, but reporting shows that automated flags can escalate quickly: an Associated Press investigation documents a Tennessee 13‑year‑old who was arrested, interrogated and strip‑searched after a school monitoring alert, and a WUSF piece notes West Palm Beach's Dreyfoos School of the Arts piloted Lightspeed Alert where students were removed within minutes after a flagged comment; in Polk County nearly 500 Gaggle alerts over four years resulted in 72 involuntary hospitalizations under Florida's Baker Act.

Technology can catch real threats, yet public data on false‑positive rates is scarce, interventions can be traumatic, and students often don't know their private chats are watched - an unsettling tradeoff that local districts, parents and policymakers must confront as lawsuits and calls for clearer oversight mount (read the AP investigation and WUSF coverage for details).

“It has routinized law enforcement access and presence in students' lives, including in their home.” - Elizabeth Laird, Center for Democracy and Technology

9) Veterans Health Venture Studio in Tampa taps AI - West Palm Beach VA teams among winners - The second annual Veterans Health Hackathon (Aug. 22–24) turned Tampa into a three‑day innovation sprint where interdisciplinary teams - drawn largely from Florida's VISN08 and backed by mentors from MIT Hacking Medicine and Microsoft - used Microsoft's generative AI tools and de‑identified VA data to prototype solutions for timely access to care, operational efficiency and community care coordination; organizers say the event drew hundreds (reports cite as many as 900 applications from 48 states, Puerto Rico and Guam) and the top concepts will advance into the Veterans Health Venture Studio to be refined, prototyped with Microsoft and piloted in VA hospitals.

Read the VA Veterans Health Hackathon event summary and the American Legion hackathon coverage for how regional VA teams are feeding a pipeline that turns hackathon ideas into real‑world pilots in veteran care VA Veterans Health Hackathon event summary and American Legion hackathon coverage.

Attribute	Details
Dates	August 22–24, 2025
Location	Tampa Marriott Water Street, Tampa, FL
Hosts / Partners	Tampa VA Medical Center; VHA Innovation Ecosystem; Microsoft; MIT Hacking Medicine; The American Legion
Key features	Generative AI tools from Microsoft; de‑identified VA data; three tracks: Timely Access, Operational Efficiency, Community Care Coordination
Next step	Winners advance to a six‑month accelerator and Veterans Health Venture Studio for prototyping and VA pilot testing

“It's very important for The American Legion because the solutions which we are creating here are going to go back and be used by the veterans in the VA.” - Dr. Indra Sandal, Chief of Innovation, James A. Haley Veterans' Hospital & Clinics

10) Memories.ai named top video‑understanding tool - implications for public safety and media - Memories.ai was voted the best video‑understanding tool for bulk video analysis in 2025 by AI‑Tech Insight, a recognition of a platform that the company says can process up to 10 million hours of footage to construct a continuous, human‑like visual memory; that scale promises to make months of surveillance searchable in seconds and to turn sprawling newsroom archives into instantly retrievable story sources, but it also raises questions about oversight and deployment.

For a deeper look at the award and what the technology claims to do, see the AI‑Tech Insight coverage via the press release and Memories.ai's product page describing on‑device and enterprise applications.

Attribute	Details
Company	Memories.ai
Award	Best video understanding tool for bulk video analysis (2025)
Recognized by	AI‑Tech Insight press coverage of the Memories.ai award
Key capability	Processes up to 10 million hours of video; long‑term temporal reasoning and natural‑language retrieval
Notable backing	Samsung (investor / partner)

“This is a monumental milestone for the entire Memories.ai team and a powerful affirmation of our vision. We are profoundly honored that Memories.ai voted the best video understanding tool for bulk video analysis. From the beginning, our goal was to move beyond simple object detection to create a system with genuine, human-like comprehension and memory.” - Shawn Shen, Co‑founder of Memories.ai

Conclusion: balancing innovation, jobs and safeguards - what to watch next - West Palm Beach's AI moment shows the upside and the stakes: big headquarters pitches promising hundreds of high‑paying roles collide with local questions about incentives, housing and oversight, while municipal pilots from chatbots to AI translation and BEACON's multilingual alerts show how quickly new tools land in civic life.

Federal policy is shifting too - the CDT's analysis of the July 2025 “Woke AI” Executive Order and the White House's AI Action Plan make clear procurement rules can reshape vendor behavior and, by extension, what models and data practices reach local governments and newsrooms.

At the same time, the evolving privacy and governance landscape - summarized in coverage of global legal changes like the EU AI Act and practical privacy guidance - means West Palm Beach needs talent pipelines and clear guardrails.

Practical steps matter: invest in training (for example, Nucamp's Nucamp AI Essentials for Work bootcamp - 15-week practical AI training for the workplace), demand transparent procurement terms, and pair job‑creation deals with workforce development and privacy‑first deployment so innovation benefits the whole community.

Attribute	Information
Description	Gain practical AI skills for any workplace; learn AI tools, prompting, and apply AI across business functions.
Length	15 Weeks
Courses included	AI at Work: Foundations; Writing AI Prompts; Job Based Practical AI Skills
Cost	$3,582 early bird; $3,942 regular
Registration	Register for Nucamp AI Essentials for Work - 15-Week Bootcamp

the EO ... requires agency heads to only procure large language model (LLM) systems that have been developed in accordance with its “unbiased AI principles” of “ideological neutrality” and “truth seeking.”