For the residents of the Auke Bay area, I hope you have all read the notice posted on the door at the local Auke Bay post office announcing that, starting in March, they will only have window service to pick up packages and mail items in the afternoon hours. Morning hours are being canceled. I know nothing about the Douglas branch post office, but understand that it too will have reduced hours of service.
As far as I can determine there will be no financial savings. No clerks are being laid off nor reduced in employment. The cost of rent and services will remain the same. The reduction of services is simply a ploy to get people to use the other postal service centers in downtown Juneau and the Mendenhall Mall so that some time in the future, postal officials can claim that they are justified in closing these branch offices because of reduced use by local customers.
Perhaps I am mistaken, perhaps what I think is true is not so. If I am wrong, I hope that the US Postal Service corrects me and explains to the public why they are making this reduction in service.
I have lived in the Auke Bay area for more than forty years and have found that the employees or clerks serving in our branch office are superb. We are not treated as “customers” but as neighbors. We don’t have to drive several miles round trip to get our mail or pick up our mail and packages.
Neighbors, please note that the U.S. Postal service is paid for by the services it provides and is not supported by taxes. It is the only national agency that I know of that is required to pay the health and benefits costs of its employees 75 years in advance. Private delivery service such as Fed Ex or UPS do not serve our neighbors in small, rural villages. Apparently these business corporations want to “skim off” what could be a lucrative income from larger, urban areas.
I don’t know what we can do as residents of the Auke Bay area or Douglas, but we must do something. Again, as far as I can tell, the reduction in service has nothing to do with saving money or financial benefits; it is simply that those in the postal service administration want to reduce services without respecting what that means to local customers.
Wallace Olson
Auke Bay
Comments (3)
Add commentday delivery
5 day delivery is a ploy to persuade letter carriers to go along with the idea due to the alure of having weekends off. At the very least it divides the carriers and threatens the stability of the NALC. The likelyhood of saturday remaining their drop day is slim. Once the Postal Service gets 5 day delivery saturday will be exchanged for say wed. or thurs. citing that with monday holidays it is impossible to get the mail delivered on tuesdays. Think about , it is very difficult to get the mail delivered on mondays now with sta. delivery. For businesses that want mail delivery on the new wed or thurs day off the PO will suggest renting a PO box which will "of corse" increase revenue. So how bad do you still want 5 day delivery if you get some day other than sat? By the way Iam not a letter carrier
Snail mail is going the way
Snail mail is going the way of the Pony Express.
It is only a matter of time until USPS will be as needed as horse buggy's.
Auke Bay is the greatest
If the PO is going to cut back or close they ought to do it at Mendenhall Valley. The employees there are great but seem to be hampered by inefficient managers. Only one or two clerks at the busiest times of the day.
Mick at Auke Bay is the greatest and is a friend to all and a great public servant. Put Mick in charge of all the Juneau facilities and he will improve service overall and might even make the chumps a buck or three.