New York begins to offer 311 nonemergency help line

NEW YORK -- With the touch of three numbers, New Yorkers can have all their questions answered: Marriage licenses, trash pickup, potholes, noise complaints, animal control.

The topics are all covered by a new 311 help line designed to answer a multitude of non-emergency questions and complaints about life in New York.

With the help line's launch in March, New York joined a handful of other cities using a 311 system, "the most revolutionary innovation in local government in the United States," according to Mitchell Moss, a New York University professor and urban planning expert.

Dallas, Los Angeles, Baltimore, San Jose, Calif., Houston and Austin, Texas, also have 311 systems.

Chicago's system, which drew 3.6 million calls last year, last week won an Innovations in American Government award, sponsored by Harvard University and the nonprofit Council for Excellence in Government.

'One-stop shopping'

Ted O'Keefe, who heads Chicago's system, called 311 "one-stop shopping."

"It helps people without clout or connections improve the quality of life in their neighborhood," he said.

New York's center promises to answer calls within 30 seconds. Callers may ask anything, anonymously. However, the case is computerized, with a tracking number to be cited when calling for follow up. Emergency calls are directed to 911.

In one case, a woman called to complain about a chicken at her door. An operator entered "chicken on stoop" into the database and connected the caller to the city Department of Health because the call was determined to be an agricultural issue.

Since March, New York's 311 system has logged more than 600,000 calls. Volume is expected to reach about 12 million calls a year, said Gino Menchini, the city's commissioner of information technology.

"This is one of the city's most democratic projects, whether you're driving a BMW and hit a pothole you want to report, or you're a homeless person looking for a soup kitchen," Menchini said.

The center reflects an approach Mayor Michael Bloomberg has tried to apply in many quarters of his administration -- transforming antiquated, paper-oriented bureaucracies into tech-savvy operations.

The city's 311 system, at a $25 million startup cost, "changes the way citizens can get access to information and services -- directly, instead of spending hours making calls and nobody picks up the phone," Moss said.