No decision yet on fate of rural postal facilities

 

Ironton will lose mail processing operations from the city’s post office.

U.S. Postal Service spokesman David Van Allen said Thursday “Ironton was one of nine post offices that will lose the behind-the-scenes machinery that sorts mail. Ironton’s operations will be moved to Columbus; the operations at the other eight post offices will be moved to either Columbus or Cleveland.”

Van Allen said the customer visiting the post office will see no changes at all as the machinery was out of public view. He said the two people affected by the change are likely to be assigned other duties at the post office.

“They don’t have enough employees as it is,” Van Allen said. “They’ll do different jobs.”

Van Allen said the mail will continue to be delivered and the post office doors will still be open for customers dropping off mail, picking up mail or purchasing products. The mail procession operations move will not affect that.

“The post office is not going anywhere,” Van Allen said.

No decision has yet been made on the fate of five rural post offices that are being studied for possible closure altogether. On that list are post offices in Waterloo, Willow Wood, Rock Camp, Haverhill and Scottown. Van Allen said that decision won’t be announced until after May 15.

The other post offices losing mail processing operations are in Akron, Athens, Canton, Chillicothe, Dayton, Steubenville, Toledo and Youngstown

Van Allen said the change is to reduce the operating costs of the U.S. Postal System by $20 billion by 2015.