AI Training and Criminal Justice Grants: The Rule Texas Local Governments Cannot Miss

Most cities and counties think of AI training as a human resources task. Texas law also makes it a grants issue. If your local government applies for state criminal justice grants, the people writing those applications need to know this rule.

What the law says

Government Code Section 772.012 has two parts that matter.

Subsection (b): to apply for a grant under Chapter 772, a local government must submit, with the application, a written certification of its compliance with the cybersecurity training and the artificial intelligence training required by Section 2054.5191.

Subsection (c): if the criminal justice division determines that a local government awarded a grant has not complied with either training requirement, the local government must pay the state an amount equal to the grant award. It is also ineligible for another grant under the chapter until the second anniversary of that determination.

What changed

The cybersecurity part is not new. HB 3512, effective September 1, 2025, added artificial intelligence training to the same certification. A process that was built to check one training requirement now has to check two.

Where this goes wrong

The risk is rarely that nobody took the training. It is that the person signing the grant certification does not have the records to back it up. A few ways that happens:

• The grants office assumes HR handled it. HR assumes the departments did.
• The cybersecurity training is tracked, but the new AI training is not.
• Staff completed a general AI course that is not a certified program.
• Elected or appointed officials who meet the test were never included.
• New hires started after the annual push and never completed either course.

How to protect your grants

1. Connect the grants calendar to the training calendar

List the grant applications you expect to submit this year and their due dates. Training completion needs to be in good shape before the first one, not only by the annual reporting deadline.

2. Give the signer the records

Whoever signs the certification should be able to see, in one place, who is required to train, who has completed certified cybersecurity and AI training, and when. If they cannot, fix that before signing.

3. Use a certified program with proof of completion

The training has to come from the certified list. A program that gives each learner a dated completion record makes the certification easy to support.

4. Close the gaps for new people

Build both trainings into onboarding for anyone who will meet the 25 percent computer-use test, and into the start of term for newly elected or appointed officials.

5. Keep the file

Save the completion records and the list you used for each year's certification. If a question ever comes up, you want to show exactly what you relied on when you signed.

Who should read this

Police and sheriff's offices, district and county attorneys, juvenile services, victim services, emergency management, and any grants coordinator who handles criminal justice funding. Share it with HR and IT too. This rule only works when those groups are using the same records.

For the wider requirement, including who has to train and what the governing body reports, see the Texas AI training requirement for cities and counties.