The Wahkiakum County Eagle - Established as The Skamokawa Eagle in 1891

Mike McGuire, who oversees all the post offices in the 986-- zip code area for the United States Postal Service, spoke to residents this week in Rosburg and Skamokawa about the USPS plan to keep their local post offices open by reducing the number of hours the window at each post office will remain open.

It's about money, he said.

“We get no taxes,” McGuire said of USPS. “We are self-supported just like any other business. We make our money off of any products we sell. Since we are losing money, we have had to take matters into our own hands. We’ve eliminated a lot of layers at the headquarters level, closing and consolidating mail processing plants.

“People are doing a lot more things online,” McGuire continued. “A lot of those transactions used to be done through the mail. Now it’s not. In the last seven years we’ve lost $40 billion in transactions.”

In order to keep many of the post offices open in small, rural areas, the USPS has had to come up with an alternative plan, and thus the decision to reduce weekday window service hours from eight to four.

The postmasters for both post offices have been offered “voluntary” retirement. If they would like to continue with USPS, another job will be found for them at a different location. If not, they have been offered an incentive to retire on September 30 or lose the incentive and work until January 9, 2015.

The day after the postmaster retires, the new reduced hours will go into effect. A part time non-contract employee will replace the postmaster and will work under the postmaster from Naselle if at Rosburg and from Cathlamet if at Skamokawa.

At this point, the hours at both post offices will be set for 8-12, Monday through Friday.

Parcel lockers will be installed so residents can pick up packages. The Rosburg Post office is open 24 hours and USPS has plans to do the same at the Skamokawa Post Office.

Pick up times at drop boxes and delivery service will remain unchanged.

If residents need to conduct business outside the new hours, they are invited to visit the Cathlamet and Naselle post offices, whose hours will remain the same.

The USPS will review each office once a year. If transactions go up, they may add more hours to window service, and alternatively, if transactions go down, they could be reduced to as little as two hours a day.