Postal carriers thanked in campaign mailing snafu

A heartfelt thank you is extended to all of the Cedar Rapids and Linn County letter carriers who returned and did not deliver the mailing of Joan McCalmant for Linn County Recorder last week.

I am a retired letter carrier and Joan's husband. Because of an error in the address list provided by the Linn County Auditor's Office, all 11,878 postcards were addressed incorrectly.

I appreciated hearing from my friends in the National Association of Letter Carriers when the cards hit the streets, and I thank them for doing their job by not delivering cards with incorrect address labels. I know how much labor was involved in pulling the cards from the delivery sequence presorted mail.

We have received letters and e-mails from people who were disturbed by this mailing. Some even indicated they were worried about identity theft and were considering not voting for Joan McCalmant because of the mix-up. We have contacted these people personally to let them know what happened.

This is approximately a $5,000 error. A claim has been forwarded to Linn County Auditor Joel Miller for reimbursement.

Gary Kaplan

Cedar Rapids