Hundreds protest USPS proposal to move mail-sorting operations to Pasco

YAKIMA, Wash. -- It was standing room only Thursday night as around 300 community members turned out for a contentious meeting with U.S. Postal Service managers about a proposal to move Yakima's mail-processing operations to Pasco.

More than 30 attendees lined up at a microphone to express their displeasure and concern over potential job eliminations and changes in mail collection times.

"I've got to believe, in spite of your best efforts, and the great staff in Yakima and Pasco, that that mail's going to be delayed," said Steve Noble, representing a printing and processing company.

Crammed into a conference room at the Howard Johnson Plaza Hotel, the crowd booed many of the responses from Postal Service representatives, dismissing them as "politicians" and questioning how big their employee bonuses would be.

The proposed move to Pasco, which officials say would save nearly $1.2 million a year, comes at a time when the self-sustaining Postal Service is facing budget woes across the country.

This year's projected $8.3 billion loss could mean the end of Saturday mail in the near future, said Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe in a recent USA Today story.

Transferring the mail-processing operations to Pasco's main post office could eliminate 19 positions in Yakima, move up local pickup times by an hour and change the postmark from Yakima to Pasco on most outgoing mail.

If processing moved to Pasco, about 82 miles away, customers could still get a local postmark by bringing their mail directly to the post office, but mail dropped in collection boxes would be postmarked in Pasco.

At the community meeting, Katherine Nash, district manager for the Postal Service's Seattle district, which includes Washington and North Idaho, responded to questions and attempted to soothe the crowd.

"Nothing is changing in front of the post offices: Retail's not changing; the drop for the collection boxes is not changing," Nash said many times during the two-hour confrontation.

"No one will lose their jobs. There are jobs in this state; there are jobs in this area," she continued. "It takes some time; you find them; they're there."

She also emphasized that the move to Pasco was not finalized, and that similar area mail processing studies were being conducted all over the state and country, not just in Yakima.

Most of her remarks were met with incredulous jeers from the noisy crowd during the largely one-sided question-and-answer period.

Several speakers mentioned that the Yakima processing center already serves more than 26 small towns and cities in Central Washington, from Cle Elum to Mabton.

"Customers need to rely on the Postal Service and know that things are going to get done right," said Jerry Gilmore, a letter carrier. "When you move mail processing ... and you say nobody will notice it, that is unbelievable."

Yakima's not the first city in Washington to encounter such a move -- at the end of 2005, mail-sorting operations for Olympia shifted to the Tacoma sorting plant, which officials said saved about $1 million.

Four years ago, a similar study for Yakima didn't go through after encountering fierce opposition, both from the community and from lawmakers who doubted the projected savings and impact on service.

A release from the Postal Service distributed at the meeting said that 35 similar consolidations were implemented last year, saving more than $99 million total. Consolidation is necessary, it said, to maintain cost efficiency in the ever-changing communication market.

Nash and the other officials said they will continue to study the potential impact of a consolidation, as well as all the comments voiced during the public meeting, in order to determine whether to move the processing operations.

It is unclear when further steps will be taken.

"The fact that we lost over $8 billion last year ... You cannot continue to do business as usual," Nash said.

* Molly Rosbach can be reached at 509-577-7628 or mrosbach@yakimaherald.com