Worcester's Main South City Service Center Closes As Part Of 311 Plan

WORCESTER, MA — A Worcester City Hall outpost in the Main South neighborhood closed recently, but city officials say they're planning to bring it back as part of Worcester's new 311 system.

The 801 Main St. municipal service center opened in early 2020 near the corner of Oread Street offering community meeting space, voter registration, bill paying and dog licensing. The pandemic interred with full plans for the center, and it was intermittently closed through early 2022 along with other city offices.

The city closed the center in early June. In the months before the closure, the center had a member of the city clerk's office at work and a Department of Health and Human Services homeless outreach worker. The services were underutilized, particularly the clerk's offerings, City Manager Eric Batista's office said.

Batista's office said the city plans to "reactivate" the space and re-brand it as the Worcester 311 Municipal Services Center. The refreshed space would still offer community meeting space, services from the City Clerk and a customer service aspect where residents can get answers about city services or file complaints.

Worcester adopted the 311 hotline over the summer of 2022, and just this week rolled out a new smartphone app that offers residents a new way to report non-emergency problems.

"Examples of service requests that can be submitted through the app include, but are not limited to, trash and recycling, streets and sidewalks, nuisances/complaints, trees, and more. Residents will also have access to resources such as online payments, job listings, and residential drop-off dates," Batista's office described in a news release.

The Worcester 311 app is available through Google Play and the Apple App Store.