16 March 2015 (08:22 UTC-07 Tango 01)/25 Jumada I-Ula 1436/25 Esfand 1393/26 Ji Mao 4713
“I thought it was just a rumor.”
“They’ll just move the work to Clark Street Post Office.”
“There’s a Postal Processing Center here?”
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- This used to be where the USPS had their sub-station in the Pine Ridge Mall, in Chubbuck.
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- The shuttered contracted PO in Chubbuck, Idaho.
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- Several meetings were held with employees at the Gateway Processing Center between March 9th & 20th. Most are being laid off by 18 April 2015.
These are most common responses I got from talking to fellow east Idahoans. 18 April 2015 is the last day of operations for the Gateway Station Processing Center on Flandro Drive in Pocatello.
Another common misconception I heard was that it was just the Gateway Post Office that was being consolidated with Clark Street Post Office. Wrong!
The Gateway Processing Center is the mail sorting and processing center for all of eastern Idaho and it will be shutdown by 18 April 2015. From that point on all mail will be sent out of state to Salt Lake City, Utah, even your letters sent ‘cross town!
Last week several meetings were held with Gateway employees notifying them of impending layoffs. At least two were offered “involuntary transfers” to Salt Lake City (meaning if they refuse they lose their jobs). Others were told to apply for two open Letter Carrier positions in Pocatello, however, at least 30 employees are already on that list and those two positions have been ‘open’ for a while. Since January about eight Gateway employees were forced to take early retirement and about a dozen have already been transfered out of the area. At least 50 good paying jobs are being lost.
Approximately 13 employees will stay on after 18 April 2015 to continue loading dock ops, and run “window operations” at the Gateway Post Office.
Unconfirmed rumors have it that eventually all Post Offices in the area will be shutdown, except Gateway Post Office, meaning everybody in the cities of Pocatello and Chubbuck will have only one Post Office.
The mayor of Pocatello has called for public hearings but it sounds like most residents don’t understand the situation, or don’t care. State and federal level politicians seem too concerned with their pet projects. We haven’t heard anything from the Chubbuck city council or mayor. In fact, the whole of eastern Idaho doesn’t seem to care even though the Gateway shutdown will directly impact mail delivery for all of east Idaho.
And lets not forget the numerous east Idaho businesses that use the United States Postal Service (USPS), like the company that makes those back breaking weight vests for divers, or the company that packs back breaking amounts of spent ammo casings into Flat Rate boxes, or the company that ships back breaking “liquid” in Flat Rate boxes. I say back breaking because package sorting is still done by hand at the Gateway Processing Center.
Which brings me to some data about Gateway, data that belies any logical reason for shutting it down. Despite still sorting packages and First Class “chunks” by hand, Gateway is the highest rated postal processing center for meeting deadlines and accuracy, higher than fully automated centers! In fact Gateway gets “incoming” mail from Boise, Idaho, and Salt Lake City that’s actually meant for other states, meaning Boise and Salt Lake screwed up!
And speaking of getting mail from Boise; in the past week and a half Boise has increased the number of trucks sent to Gateway to five per day. There’s a new “extra” 04:00 hours Boise truck arriving six days per week now.
USPS administrators claim there might be only a day delay in mail delivery, that’s impossible. It will take one day to drive the daily mail down to Salt Lake City, then another day to drive it back, that’s two days right there. Data already shows that Salt Lake City mail processors take longer to sort the mail than Gateway, and now they have to sort east Idaho’s mail as well, so who knows how long that will take. Now couple that with the fact that 82 USPS processing centers across the United States are being shutdown this year, and an estimated 15-thousand USPS jobs being eliminated, that’s got to mean a significant delay in delivery!
Between 2012 and 2013 about 141 USPS processing centers were consolidated or shutdown. Since 2006 approximately 216-thousand postal jobs were eliminated!
Postal services are still far cheaper than UPS or FedEx. Some people say shutting down postal centers are necessary because the USPS is losing money, but if that were the case how was the USPS able to hand Congress billions of dollars in cash to fund the government retirement system? (that’s doubly impressive since the USPS is not taxpayer funded) And if the USPS is a money losing operation then why is Staples so adamant about taking over Post Office operations?
For years now the American Postal Workers Union has been warning that the U.S. Congressional Postal Commission is working to sell off the USPS to the highest bidder. In the long run it will mean low paid workers with no benefits and yet you’ll have to pay more for shipping, that’s always what happens.
When are the People going to wake up and take action?
USPS & Staples continue ‘trial’ deal to run Post Offices!
Staples takes over U.S. Postal Service?
USPS reports a $2-billion USD loss for their fiscal 3rd quarter!
Congress screws over the Postal Service, 3,600 offices to close
More Economic Decline: Chubbuck’s Allstate call center already killing jobs!
More Economic Decline: East Idaho city in Death Spiral
More Economic Decline: Idaho politicians give away more than $1-million in Idaho taxes, to France!
More Economic Decline: Heinz pulls stake, Warren Buffett abandons Pocatello
Unpaid contractor is winning bidder for abandoned Hoku Materials factory, again!
Pocatello’s Old Fred Meyer & Albertsons on Yellowstone Ave, did not close down in the 1990s