Some deliveries are in arrears
Post office delays amid holiday and pandemic leave residents upset
One of the post office’s mottos, “We deliver for you,” didn’t apply for a week in one Lehigh Valley neighborhood.
Aaron Rothstein lives in west Allentown, near Cedar Crest College, and said he went that long without receiving any mail.
In a period when the U.S. Postal Service has dealt with criticism over delays in processing the mail, this was a new twist: at least one neighborhood going multiple days without any mail last week.
To Rothstein, the unthinkable happened.
“I know there are delays, but I’m waiting for important checks,” Rothstein said this week. “I’ve had people say they’ve sent me items in the mail 12 days ago. I checked up and down the street, and there’s just been nothing at all.”
By Monday, Rothstein said, a carrier showed up to walk his neighborhood’s route, and he received a few pieces of mail.
Record amounts of mail compounded with staffing shortages due to the surge in coronavirus cases, as well as changes implemented by the Trump administration, have affected delivery across the nation. Locally, last week’s snowstorm — and people who didn’t remove snow — could have also contributed to the already-seen spike in delays.
The Postal Service and other carriers have been at full shipping capacity for months since shoppers shifted their buying online during the pandemic.
“While every year the Postal Service carefully plans for peak holiday season, a historic record of holiday volume compounded by a temporary employee shortage due to the COVID-19 surge, and capacity challenges with airlifts and trucking for moving this historic volume of mail are leading to temporary delays,” the agency said last week in a news release.
Desai Abdul-Razzaaq, a Postal Service spokesperson, said the agency has taken steps to address issues caused by the pandemic, including hiring seasonal employees and allocating employees to facilities that need additional resources.
“We are confident that our processing and delivery will return to normal levels quickly,” he said.
But he declined to disclose how the agency is dealing with the slowness, or how many postal workers in the Lehigh
Valley have tested positive for the coronavirus. He did say that, since March, 27,599 postal workers nationwide have tested positive for COVID-19. Some 2,032 people work at postal facilities in the region, including 549 employees at the processing and distribution center in Hanover Township, Northampton County.
An official with the National Association of Letter Carriers’ headquarters in Washington did not return messages seeking comment.
Andy Kubat, president of another union representing postal workers, said the Lehigh Valley Sectional Center in Hanover Township, Northampton County, as well as the main Allentown and Bethlehem post offices have seen 15-20 COVID cases in the last month.
Other workers have been forced to quarantine at home, said Kubat, president of Lehigh Valley Area Local of the American Postal Workers Union, which represents more than 500 workers in postal facilities.
While Kubat said the increasing load of packages being shipped because of the pandemic contributed to the slowdown, “the other part of it is the staffing issue. There’s just not enough people to move the volume of mail we have. Obviously more bodies would help.”
Kubat noted shipping behemoth Amazon said Monday it closed a warehouse distribution center in New Jersey. One media report said the shutdown would last until Saturday at a facility in Robbinsville after an uptick in coronavirus cases.
“The volume is now coming to us,” Kubat said, adding other shippers have cut off retailers’ packages to consumers over concerns they could become overwhelmed. “Now with Amazon closing, there might be additional volume coming.”