Does your Clear Lake Observer-American arrive too late for you to attend events taking place on the date of publication? The blame lies with the U.S. Postal Service (USPS).
Lake County Publishing takes the papers each week to the post office in Clearlake. You”d think that from there, it would be a short trip to a neighboring Lake County community. Instead, the USPS sends our papers out-of-county to a North Bay sorting facility. Then and only then, are they delivered back to local zip codes.
When I was growing up in Calistoga, I remember a similar problem with delivery between Napa County communities. This problem was resolved 30 or more years ago. Why does mail service between Lake County communities remain so grossly inefficient? Delays imposed by the USPS sabotage this paper”s ability to serve its local communities.
A recent letter complaining about late delivery of the Observer American was sent from an address in Lower Lake. The writer complained that the paper does not arrive until Friday in the letter writer”s mailbox. By then, events taking place on Wednesday or Thursday of that week are “long gone” in the writer”s words.
The writer insisted that the letter was not for publication, which makes it difficult for our newspaper to publicize this ongoing problem. If people were willing to speak on-the-record by writing a letter to the editor, it would make a much stronger case for efficient mail delivery.
The letter”s route via USPS illustrates, in reverse, the needless delays in delivery. The letter, dated Aug. 10, 2009 (and mailed from Lower Lake, remember) was addressed to our south county office on Lakeshore Drive in Clearlake. There”s a distance of roughly five miles between post offices in Clearlake and Lower Lake.
The letter bears a cancellation mark dated Aug. 11, 2009 from North Bay CA 949.
Last-minute submissions compound the problem that is created by USPS. The letter writer singled out a telephone town hall hosted by U.S. Rep. Mike Thompson, which took place on Aug. 5, and a meeting to discuss algae in the lake, which happened Aug. 6. Both meetings were publicized in the Aug. 5 Observer American.
“It would be nice if things taking place on Wednesday, Thursday and even Friday could be announced in the paper coming out the week before the event, so we could have a chance of attending,” the letter writer asserts. Unfortunately, organizers of many events wait until the very last minute to submit their announcements.
The Observer American does not have the luxury of printing events a week ahead of time, if organizers fail to submit their announcements in a timely fashion. For this reason, we request that announcements be submitted two weeks ahead of time ? but this request is frequently ignored.
And printing events a week ahead will not resolve the underlying problem: that the USPS inefficiently ships mail out-of-county when it is only traveling between Lake County zip codes.
So, next time you are fuming about an event that late mail delivery caused you to miss, please place blame where it is due. You are welcome and encouraged to go on record by writing a letter to the editor but please direct your private complaints to the U.S. Postal Service, 14500 Olympic Drive, Clearlake, CA 95422-9998; (800) ASK-USPS.
Cynthia Parkhill is the focus pages editor for the record-Bee and editor of the Clear Lake Observer?American. She can be contacted at ObserverAmerican@gmail.com or 263-5636 ext. 28.
