Local bulk mailers wary about postal changes

After one change already this year, Jake Krob is wary of the Postal Service's proposed shift of mail sorting from Cedar Rapids.

"This is a big change, and its worries me what changes are going to happen," said Krob, co-publisher of the weekly Mount Vernon-Lisbon Sun.

Until August, Krob delivered the week's Sun to the Mount Vernon post office for delivery Thursday mornings to local subscribers. Then the postal service consolidated its Mount Vernon and Marion routes, so the papers now go to Marion for next-day delivery.

"That has caused some problems, but nothing we can't work out," said Krob, whose West Branch Communications also publishes five other Eastern Iowa weeklies. "But I would suspect that's going to get worse. My fear is this is just the beginning."

Krob and other mailers are closely following the postal service proposal, announced in September, to end mail processing in Cedar Rapids. Instead, local mail would be hauled 90 miles to the Quad Cities Processing and Distribution Facility in Milan, Ill., for sorting. Locally-addressed mail would make a round trip that could take up to three days instead of the present overnight service.

That change, still the subject of a feasibility study, would affect only non-local subscribers, Krob said.

"If you mailed a letter, say on Wednesday, with the reduced delivery standard it may not get to where it needs to go in Cedar Rapids until Monday," said Brian Hamrick of Springville, an electronics technician at the Cedar Rapids post office.

Alliant Energy doesn't mail its bills from Cedar Rapids, but bills from customers in its Iowa and Minnesota service territory are addressed to the utility's downtown offices - 54,000 on a typical Monday, the heaviest day of the week, according to spokesman Justin Foss.

"We are very attuned to what's going on with the postal service," said Foss. "Once they come to a more finalized plan, then we're going to know how it's going to impact us."

Longer delivery times could affect Cedar Rapids customers who cut it close mailing their bills, which Alliant mails "in an ample amount of time" before they're due, Foss said. He noted there's a simple solution: signing up to pay bills online.

"I do it, and it works great," he said.

Steve Lorenz, print product director for SourceMedia, said he's also awaiting further details from the postal service. SourceMedia publishes The Gazette and the Pennysaver, and Lorenz said the publications are delivered directly to 19 post offices.

The Cedar Rapids change is part of the postal service's effort to cut $3 billion in costs. Agency officials are considering cutting the number of processing centers from 487 to 200 by 2013.

A postal service spokesman didn't return calls today.

"There's no doubt the postal service to do some consolidation, but it  needs to be done over time," said Hamrick, a 14-year employee. "They're talking about doing this over two years. T0 go from 500 to 200 processing plants nationwide, that's going to effect the entire nation."