BANGOR, Maine — The U.S. Postal Service is surveying customers of Maine’s smallest post offices to determine their preferences for retail and delivery services in the aftermath of major restructuring.
The surveys are part of the U.S. Postal Service’s effort to keep the nation’s smallest post offices open for business, Tom Rizzo, spokesman for the U.S. Postal Service Northern New England District, said Wednesday.
Unveiled in May, the Post Office Structure Plan, or POST plan, provides a framework for cutting costs so the USPS can regain its financial stability, according to a news release the organization issued. The service was losing more than $23 million a day at the time.
The plan allows for keeping existing post offices in place, but with modified window hours to match customer use, while continuing to provide the access to the retail lobby and post office boxes that now exist. In addition, towns would retain their ZIP codes and community identities.
The plan also allows for alternatives, including a shift to mail delivery service by either rural carrier or highway contract route; contracting with local businesses that would serve as village post offices; and offering service from another nearby post office.
A voluntary early retirement incentive for the nation’s more than 21,000 nonexecutive postmasters was also announced in May.
Nationally, 13,000 post offices would be affected by the restructuring plan, Rizzo said. Of those, 244 are in Maine, he said.
Postal customers in Eddington are among the affected postal customers who received surveys this week. A letter accompanying the surveys said the USPS will discuss the proposed changes and answer any questions customers have during a meeting set for 4 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 29, at the local post office, which is located at 1042 Main Road.
In the surveys they received this week, Eddington residents were asked to choose among four alternatives:
• Keep the post office open but with reduced weekday hours. In Eddington’s case, business hours would drop from seven to four a day, according to a letter sent to a postal customer from that town. Saturday hours and access of post office boxes would stay the same, the letter said.
• Conduct a discontinuance study for the office and provide roadside mailbox delivery. Retail and delivery service would be provided through a rural carrier.
• Conduct a discontinuance study and find an alternative site to be operated by a contractor, typically a local business, where customers could buy stamps and flat-rate products. That option likely would provide more business hours than the post office could, the letter indicates.
• Conduct a discontinuance study and relocate post office box service to another nearby post office.
Eddington customers also were asked which business hours they would prefer if the decision is to cut back to four hours a day.
“Meeting the needs of postal customers is, and will always be, a top priority. We continue to balance that by better aligning service options with customer demand and reducing the cost to serve,” Postmaster General and CEO Patrick R. Donahoe said when announcing the restructuring plan in May.
“With that said, we’ve listened to our customers in rural America and we’ve heard them loud and clear — they want to keep their post office open. We believe today’s announcement will serve our customers’ needs and allow us to achieve real savings to help the Postal Service return to long-term financial stability,” Donahoe said.
The new strategy will be implemented over two years, or by September 2014. Once it has been fully implemented, the USPS projects it will save a half billion dollars annually.
“The post offices in rural America will remain open unless a community has a strong preference for one of the other options,” USPS Chief Operating Officer Megan Brennan said. “We will not close any of these rural post offices without having provided a viable solution.”
Too many very small towns have full time or near full time postmasters and mail carriers. If we go back to the village post boxes at a store or other business, you get more hours, usually, and still enough service. Without a major change in how post offices are run, we cannot keep the low first class mail stamp rate we have. Consider that 40 years ago, the daily paper was about 25 cents, 7 or 8 cents more than first class, if I remember correctly. Look at the comparison of costs for these two itmes now. A first class stamp should, if adjusted to the newspaper cost, should be about 75 or 80 cents. For the few first class letters I send, I could live with that better than having the fed’s bail out the USPS with tax dollars. Just a thought.
But you are forgetting one thing the post office by law can not make a profit an if they do the government takes it plus all the pre funding they half to do . For people that are not even born yet that will work for the post office an retire .
The Town of Wilton has THREE post offices, all within a few miles of each other that serve downtown Wilton, Dresden and East Wilton, all parts of Wilton. Why can’t this be consolidated? How many other rural locations are redundant? It is nice to keep things status quo, but if a family owned three houses in the same town and could not pay their bills, the change they needed to make would be obvious.
You mean Dryden, not Dresden. But your point is well taken. Years ago, I lived in Oxford County and they had four post offices in Waterford.
The USPS gets ZERO tax dollars.Everything they have for income is from the sale of products.
Let’s not go bonkers worrying about the cost of the post office…The military takes ukp %60 of the US budget and doesn’t turn a profit; police don’t turn a profit; schools don’t turn a profit, etc…
re: 60%
‘Freedom’ is not free! Goethe nailed it with, “None are so hopelessly enslaved as those who falsely believe they are free.”
Render Unto Caesar–
“In his press conference the other night, President Bush said freedom is a gift from the Almighty, and we have been called by God to use our military power to spread freedom throughout the world. Then he called that Sadr guy in Iraq a religious nutcase.”
–G.W. Bush, quoted by Jay Leno.
It’s about time Congress realizes the Post Office needs a break from their rules!
They could also cut the number of home delivery days from six to five (or even fewer). We don’t really need home mail delivery six days a week.
And we don’t need a little post office every few miles..Lincolnville has 2…LOL…Mail is going the way of the Pony Express..Times are changing no matter how much Mainers hate it…LOL..
Do you live in or near a town with an immune PO?
When ever I hear the word reform coming from the Republicans I shudder!
The Postal Reform Act of 2006 was a deliberate attempt to destroy the Post Officein order to replace it with a Private For Profit Scheme!!
These Miscreants need to be exposed for what they are!
Political Terrorist!
Absolutely right.More union busting and lies from the right.
You boys are full of it. Did it ever occur to you that unions should be abolished? the unions did a good deed years ago but times have changed and thus the country is in deep financial distress. trying to place blame on people who are trying to help the USPS is not acceptable to place entirely on the Right. time to get over the lib know it all rant. That is old and over used.
Times have changed all right (pun intended?). The bosses now rule the roost.
Congress needs to relax the “Savings for retirees”, and Saturday service could be cut without too much screaming. There are too many branches and some are pointed out in these very comments.
End Saturday deliveries, Cut out the redundant post offices in those communities that have more than one post office, bring the pay and benefit package more in line with the private sector.
Many smaller towns have post offices that could be served by larger communities right next door, Perham, Crouseville could be done by Washburn. Fort Kent and Fort Kent mills (same town two post offices) Blane could be done by Mars Hill, Sinclair by St. Agatha. New Sweden and Stockholm could combine. And these are just a few that I drive by every week in the county, imagine how much could be saved just doing this nationwide.
I’m sure the %^&*$ unions would get in the way of a common sense approach like this.
Yes sure cut out the “redundant post offices in town that have more than one PO. BUT when a small town PO would get shut down, the residents will then have to drive great distances in Many areas to get their mail at a larger PO. And may Only have a few days a week that the new PO would be open. THis entire situation hopefully will reach a common agreement with people in Maine and especially the people who live in very rural areas. Everyone pays taxes. That means that the People pay the USPS employees. just saying.
Wrong as usual.USPS gets ZERO tax dollars.Everything is from sale of product.Get your facts straight just once.
As a Rural Mail Carrier Cutting Saturday Deliveries is not going to save the USPS , It will Double or Triple the Amount of Mail to be Delivered on Monday or on Tuesday (day after a holiday) #1 Cutting Saturday’s will keep the carriers out later which means later Mail for Homes and Most Businesses will be closed so they wont get mail or Packages until the next day (Joy Eaton) # 2) The long Winters in Maine, It’s dark @ 4:00, Driving in the dark and/or a Snow Storm is putting a Mail Carrier and others at an unnecessary risk! #3 People get a lot of Meds through the Mail and a lot are Delivered on Saturdays , So you cut Saturdays, meds don’t arrive until LATE at night on Monday or if a Monday Holiday, Even LATER on Tuesday Night! (Which goes back to #2 , Dangerous Driving Conditions.) #4 , Money you think the USPS would be Saving would be Cut by the Overtime they would have to pay to some And For Rural Carriers, We have an Evaluated Time for Each Route, Let’s say a Route is Evaluated at 7 Hrs. If we have a start time to be at the PO in the Morning @ 7:30 to start Sorting and casing the mail ( some people think the mail is all ready for us when we get to work, not so) So you Start @ 7:30 and the Route is a 7 Hr. Route, Anything Past that 7 hrs We Work For FREE, So All the Examples above and Driving with More Mail , Snowy , Slippery Conditions, Darkness a Carrier could be out past his/her 7 hour route time by 3 – 4 hrs , maybe more and Working to make sure You get your Mail and doing 3-4 hrs maybe more FOR FREE. But I tell you this, Come Hell or High Water WE WILL GET YOU YOUR MAIL ONE WAY OR ANOTHER ! Thank You All For Your Service!
The last time I went to the Post Office- many months ago- it was to mail something within the town I live in, and I asked when it would get there….was told it had to go out and come back….this is nuts?
Honestly though, people pay bills online, and communicate via phone or internet. Shut half the post offices in this State- and cut the deliveries to 4-5 a week for now- more later. Its inevitable- why fight it!
Because small businesses use the mail and it must be timely. That’s why.
If they get delivered at all!
Joy, Not sure where you live but I do know that as a Rural Mail Carrier I and others Deliver everything we get, We don’t want anybody or business not getting what is theirs. That said, There are some bad apples so to speak, everywhere, so please don’t paint with a broad brush. Also , we can only deliver what has come into the Post Office that morning, if it’s late or missing, in most cases please don’t fault the carrier or the local Post Office …. Thank You
The Postal service has many problems that mostly have very simple solutions. The mandate by Congress to pre fund retirement for employees that have yet to be hired is insane. There are far too many post offices for small population areas, close the locations that are too close to each other such as Blaine which is less than a mile from the Mars Hill location, Sheridan which is 2-3 miles from Ashland, the three offices in the Wilton area as mentioned by another post. Cut delivery to 4 days per week and extend office hours to better serve customers needs. I fail to see the rational of a business that tells you that if you come to our location to pick up your mail, we will charge you $100.00+ per year (for a P.O. Box), but we will deliver it to your mailbox essentially no matter where you are for free.
The Postal service failed to see how email, UPS , FedEx and online billpay capabilities would impact their customer base and are now paying the price. Take the politics out of what should be no more than sound business decisions and everything would be fine.
There are some simple solutions that would be relatively pain free.
1. MDI has far more post offices than needed…..close up at least half of them.
2. The tiny town of Tremont has three (3) post offices….why???? The population is less than 2000.
3. There are five (5) post offices within a 10 mile radius to where I live which is not on MDI. Close all but one.
I’m sure there are similar situations in other areas so keep the needed ones open and close the others. The public will still be served with little if any pain.
Common sense is all it would take but instead when they choose to close a post office they go after one that would create a hardship.
Keep in mind that the MINUTE you try to close a PO the AARP gets the old folks fired up.
You can’t compete with that gang.
What the USPS needs to do is make sure they deliver their packages! Missing packages happen more often within the last two years than ever before. They aren’t delivering them and businesses suffer because of their inabilities…