Laserfiche WebLink
Small towns fight attempts to move post offices Page 3 of 5 <br /> continuously running postoffice west of the Mississippi,became <br /> • the subject of an intense lobbying battle. The postoffice continues <br /> to operate, thanks in part to a subsidy from the city of Auburn. <br /> In Minnesota, Rep. David Minge, a Democrat, tried to save <br /> Montevideo's downtown postoffice, as well as those in DeGraff and <br /> Nassau. He was successful in Montevideo, and postal officials <br /> agreed not to move to the postoffice to the outskirts of town. But <br /> Nassau has been told its postoffice will be shuttered. <br /> Rep. Collin Peterson, a Democrat, has weighed in to keep postal <br /> facilities from moving out of the center of Fergus Falls,Bemidji <br /> and other towns in his northern Minnesota district. Other <br /> representatives from rural districts tell similar stories, and nearly <br /> seven dozen,including Peterson, have cosponsored Blumenauer's <br /> legislation. <br /> Legislative changes <br /> To give more weight to the planning and economic concerns of <br /> towns, legislation proposed by Blumenauer and Jeffords would <br /> require the Postal Service to follow "minimum community contact <br /> procedures" that would apply to the relocation, new construction <br /> • and closing of postoffices. Current rules require the Postal Service <br /> to measure community reaction only when closing is planned. <br /> In 1998, the Postal Service put a moratorium on closing its more <br /> than 38,000 postoffices, except under limited circumstances. As a <br /> result, closings dropped from 145 in 1997 to fewer than 100 last <br /> year. <br /> Paperwork was completed before the moratorium to close seven <br /> small offices in southwestern Minnesota where postmasters have <br /> retired or moved on,but those closures also seem unlikely <br /> immediately, said Sheldon Manthei,regional manager of postoffice <br /> operations in Willmar. <br /> That includes the postoffice in Arco, a Lincoln County town of <br /> about 100 people where the postoffice is open four hours a day and <br /> averages seven daily transactions. <br /> Dennis Healy,the Arco city clerk, said recently that having a <br /> postoffice is "part of being a community. That's where people meet <br /> and interact with one another." It's also critical to getting some <br /> businesses into vacant buildings, he said. The cafe and locker plant <br /> • next to the postoffice have closed, and the town has no grocery <br /> store. <br /> However, Manthei predicted that such offices eventually will be <br /> http://w.../article?thisSlug=POST21&date=21-Jun-99&word=office&word=post&word=office 6/24/99 <br />