City Hall Monitor: Minneapolis 311 service could go metrowide for RNC

People in town for the Republican National Convention will be able to get event information, tourist tips, traffic updates and travel directions by calling Minneapolis’s 311 service on their cell phones, if arrangements currently underway are successful.

The idea is for delegates, media and others visiting the Twin Cities for the RNC to have one easy-to-reach source of information about convention activities, as well as other things to do and places to go. It would not work from land lines, such as hotel phones, outside of Minneapolis, but it would be accessible by cell phone throughout the metropolitan area.

Still, the project remains “iffy,” according to Sara Dietrich, Minneapolis communications director, with technical and other details still to be ironed out. Whether Minneapolis 311 operators would staff the RNC 311 information line is one of many questions yet to be resolved, Dietrich said, but the convention host committee or other government agencies will be tapped to support the initiative.

Another question is whether the RNC 311 service would have the kind of information visiting protesters might need to know—like, “Where’s my friend who just got arrested?” While police hope they won’t need to arrest people, Dietrich said, 311 already provides this service for Minneapolis, and Ramsey County booking information would be available to operators via the Web.

But remaining wrinkles aside, the plan is already up and running in a sort of beta version: The city’s 311 information and referral service, normally restricted to Minneapolis, is currently available metrowide. (As preparation for providing RNC visitors even in far-flung suburbs with 24-hour “concierge service,” another official told a community meeting last month, the city has already “had the satellite turned.”)

Despite its wide reach, Minneapolis 311 remains Minneapolis-centric for now. A call about a malfunctioning left-turn signal is the kind of softball pitch that 311 operators can normally knock out of the park with a ready referral to the relevant city department. But this call originated from Old Shakopee Road on the far side of the Mall of America. How to reach the appropriate authority to fix the signal? “Try the Blue Pages,” was 311’s suggestion.