Locals anticipate post office to stay at annex

Efforts by members of the community to persuade United States
Post Office officials to re-open a post office downtown seem to
have hit a wall last week.
A meeting between city officials, community advocates, a
district representative from Congressman Mike Thompson’s office and
post office officials held last Thursday ended in disappointment
for those hoping the post office would consider opening up a
storefront location downtown after the Center Street post office
burned down last month.
“Their intent is very clear,” said Healdsburg Mayor Jim Wood.
“They have no intention of reopening in the downtown area.”
Wood said he was disheartened when a representative from the San
Francisco district office of the USPS opened the meeting by stating
that the post office will stay put at the Foss Creek annex, which
is currently being renovated to increase parking and provide PO
boxes and a customer service counter.
“I think their minds have been made up for awhile and this
meeting was more about telling us what they were going to do than
asking for our input,” Wood said. “I personally feel that we were
misled. If the decision was going to be that definitive so quickly,
they could have just come out and said that.”
Wood said the post office representatives did agree to give the
city 60 days to submit information and options for the post office
to consider, and that during that time a survey will be sent out to
all residents in the 95448 zip code that asks questions about how
the mail services are currently utilized.
However, U.S. Postal Service Spokesperson for the San Francisco
district James Wigdel, who was at the meeting last week, said the
post office has not made any definitive decisions.
“While the Postal Service made the decision to make permanent
changes to the Foss Creek Circle Postal facility by adding retail
and PO box services, we have not made a final decision regarding a
postal presence in the downtown area,” Wigdel said.
“We are open to suggestions and working with the community and
to that end, we will soon be mailing a survey to every residential,
P.O. Box and business delivery in Healdsburg. We feel that getting
community input is essential to determine what postal needs are of
importance to all residents. At the conclusion of the survey
period, we will analyze the data and evaluate the options.”
But, others at the meeting didn’t feel the post office
representatives gave the impression there was anything the
community or city could do to persuade them into opening a downtown
location.
Ray Holley who has led the community effort to rally support for
a downtown post office, was disillusioned by the meeting as
well.
“There was no question in my mind that they had made up their
mind, and as far as I am concerned, they are just humoring us by
agreeing to take our comments,” he said.
Holley contends that the post office is required to hold a
public meeting when there is a change of scope, like closing a post
office, but said that post office representatives are disagreeing
that the Healdsburg case falls under that requirement.
“They are saying that because there was a fire, that constitutes
an emergency and they don’t have to go through that process,”
Holley said.
“My impression is that they know what the community is going to
say, and it’s not going to make any difference so they figure, why
bother?”
Wood said the city would still attempt to make a case.
“My feeling when we left was that we are going to try to make a
case — to see if there’s anything we can do,” he said. “But I left
with the feeling that unless we build out the space, pay for the
lease and pay for the postal employee, we’re not going to have a
post office downtown. They really didn’t leave a lot of doors
open.”