Fort Myers City Council approved a plan May 5 to expand its use of artificial intelligence program ChatGPT because of projected productivity gains, enhanced security and long-term cost efficiency for city operations. At the request of Information Technology Services Director Richard Calkins, the city will transition from its limited ChatGPT pilot program to a full ChatGPT Enterprise license through Open AI reseller Carahsoft, costing $72,000 per year. The city tested ChatGPT with 30 users to evaluate the benefits of scaling up use to 150 and eventually 1,100 staff across various departments. Based on 150 users with an average salary of $35 per hour, the city estimated conservatively that it can cut enough working hours using ChatGPT to save $42,000 per week or $1.092 million per year, roughly equivalent to 15 full-time jobs per year.