Delta Post Office gets a reprieve

USPS grants delay for post office repairs

BY CINDY TOOPES COURIER STAFF WRITER

DELTA — Another 60 days. That’s the reprieve U.S. Postal Service gave the Delta Post Office.

Federal postal representatives conducted a public meeting this week. Officials had indicated they couldn’t negotiate a new lease with the building’s owner and planned to close the post office Aug. 30.

The Delta Community Fire Department Board owns the building and department members don’t think much negotiating went on.

Fire Board Secretary-Treasurer June Rice said Friday that the Delta community met with Catherine Ellett, post office operations manager from Des Moines, and her team.

“The fire board and the postal service agreed to the 60-day lease extension and during that time the board will confirm the plan with the U.S. Postal Service leasing agency in Denver,” Rice said.

Within 30 days, a neutral contractor will be hired by the Denver office to inspect the building. Then the fire board will have 30 days to make all identified repairs. At the end of the 60 days, the USPS will reconsider the building lease renewal.

“The postal authorities basically talked about postal services and the changes that would result if services were suspended,” Rice said. “They wouldn’t answer specific questions about the building concerns. They feel that is only the business of the landlord.”

Ed Molyneux is a member of the fire department board and he attended the meeting.

“[The postal officials] will have an inspector check the building and, if the fire department can meet the requirements, they might consider not closing,” Molyneux said Friday. “They also said they will have another meeting here.”

If the postal service is trying to be cost-effective, Molyneux thinks they’ve missed the mark. He has retired from 38 years as a rural carrier.

“By the time you add 48-50 boxes to a route, then stop and dismount to deliver, you’ve added more time,” he said. “Then you travel 16 miles every day — sort mail in Sigourney, then come to Delta and back to Sigourney. Another whole post office’s volume of mail will go to another post office.”

Multiply that by about 350 days a year. Molyneux speculated the postal service will hire another clerk for the Sigourney office.

Molyneux said the town “will try to cooperate with the postal inspectors.”

“If they put too big a demand us, if they say we’ve not met the requirements, well, they can say that,” Molyneux said. “[This closing] is one of many that’s coming. I think [federal postal officials] have a quota to fill so they can make bonuses in Des Moines.”

Rich Watkins is the spokesman for the Des Moines-based Hawkeye District of the U.S. Postal Service.

“Basically what’s happened, the fire board is the lease holder and we have problems with leaks and falling ceiling tiles,” Watkins said Friday. “We requested the landlord make repairs, which were initially cited in September 2007.”

The fire board requested a delay because there was a problem with a contract for repairs and cold weather arrived early. Watkins said the USPS facilities office in Denver granted the delay but said the board “needed to take care of the repairs in the spring.”

“Then it starts raining again and that’s when the suspension process began,” Watkins said. “We have to have a safe, secure building for customers and employees.”

Watkins said Delta made the repairs and USPS wants one of their facility specialists to certify the repairs are up to code.

“Once that determination is made in the next 30 days, they’ll be given 30 days extra if it’s not up to code,” he said. “We are looking forward to regular service from that post office.”

Rice said “some people” left Thursday’s meeting “feeling that the 60 days were given to Delta to quiet the community.”

“The fire board is very hopeful that all repairs named by the inspector can be made within the boundaries of their budget,” Rice said. “We have an old two-story brick building so the findings of an inspector are unpredictable. It’s our hope the lease will be renewed.”

Delta is eight miles west of Sigourney in Keokuk County. The town’s population is 409.

Cindy Toopes can be reached at (641) 683-5376 or via e-mail at cindy@ottumwacourier.com.

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