The Post Office in Aripeka

This Post Office means a lot to a lot of people!

Bay News 9 announced this morning that Carl Norfleet had purchased the land where the Aripeka Post Office is located and intends to enter negotiations with the USPS to sign a new lease to continue the operation of the Post Office in Aripeka.

For those of you who did not attend the Public Meeting with the USPS, Carl Norfleet announced at the meeting that he would buy the land IF the USPS would consider entering into a new lease with him to operate the Post Office in Aripeka.  There was no definitive decision at the meeting but representatives from the USPS said it was certainly something they would consider.

By purchasing the land on this week, Carl Norfleet has put the possible lease back on the table, now we wait and see how the USPS responds to this development.  Here's hoping they will sign a new lease and get our Post Office going again.

Rain...

As the rain continues to fall for the fourth day in a row, the puddles are getting deeper, but luckily we have sandy soil and there is not a lot of mud.  The ibis' have joined the wild turkeys in the field and are enjoying a nice meal.

Seems like ONLY the birds are enjoying this weather, the rest of us are tired of it!

Speak Out, the USPS is just forgetting about us in Aripeka!

NOW CLOSED!

Friday the 13th was a very unlucky day for those of us who live in Aripeka West and most other Aripekans, the USPS officially closed the Post Office located on Aripeka Road.  This Post office had been in operations since the early 1920's, but now it is only a memory.

The USPS says it was closed due to a lease dispute, but those of us who used this Post Office as the ONLY way to get mail delivery feel completely forgotten by the USPS.  It is like we really don't exist as far as the USPS is concerned, 189 households and more moving here each day as our winter residents return, who now must travel 14 miles and spend 30 minutes of their day, just to get their mail, all of this while almost all residents of the United States enjoy curbside delivery, there are even places in the country that still get mail delivered to their door!

MY mail delivered? Only in my dreams!

All we are asking for is that OUR mail be available in OUR community, "cluster boxes" would be fine with us, curbside delivery would be fine too.  We are not asking for anything that adjoining communities do not already have, their mail delivered by the United States Postal Service.

Possible solution for getting MY mail

They sent us letters to notify us of the impending closing on September 21st back in August, then came a new letter moving the closing up a week to September 13th, then on September 10th I received a letter saying "Thank You" for completing our questionnaire, what questionnaire did I complete, I haven't completed a questionnaire since late summer 2012 when the USPS asked everyone living in
Aripeka whether they favored keeping the Post Office open with reduced hours or getting curbside delivery or moving it all to the Hudson unit.  I voted for curbside delivery, but I know a lot of you voted for keeping the Post Office open with reduced hours.  I now believe that the USPS had no real intentions of keeping the Post Office in Aripeka open, it was just USPS's way of saying we gave you a chance and hey, you didn't want change, now it is just going to be our way or nothing!

Where I used to MY mail!

On the September 12th, I received another letter dated September 11th from the USPS along with a questionnaire front and back asking how I used the Post office.  Now really, what the heck do they think I use the Post Office in Aripeka for????  TO GET MY MAIL, that is what I use it for, as do approximately 188 other households and a few businesses that DO NOT get mail delivered to their homes and offices.

To add insult to injury, The USPS enclosed another notice appropriately called "Post Office On Wheels" explaining the abundances of services offered by MY Rural or Highway Carrier.  What Rural or Highway Carrier do I have???  Are they just completely stupid or what???  Why in the world would the USPS brag about all their services available from the mail carrier when their is NO mail carrier in my area??? 




The Missing MAILBOX that all of MY Postal Services Revolve Around!

Mail Carriers will accept MY packages at MY mailbox, I can buy stamps from MY mail carrier at  My mailbox, I can purchase Money Orders from MY mail carrier if I wait at MY mailbox, I can use special service like Certified, Registered, Express Mail, Delivery Confirmation, Signature Confirmation and COD by placing notes in MY mailbox, heck, they will even hold MY mail during MY absence and resume MY delivery upon MY return if I leave a note in MY mail box. So it appears to me that MY only problem is that I do not have MY mailbox in front of My house.  If this is the only problem, why didn't the USPS just tell me?  Mailboxes are sold everywhere, they sell Mailboxes at places where they do not even sell stamps, as a matter of fact it is a lot easier to find a Mailbox to purchase than it is to find stamps to purchase.  Yes, that must be the problem with getting MY mail from the Postal Services, NO MAILBOX!!!

The Postal Service has a long history of using manufactured problems over lease negotiations to close post offices by emergency suspension, to initiate a discontinuance procedure, and to justify relocations to smaller spaces.  The Postal Service typically tells the media that the landlord terminated the lease or the parties couldn’t come to an agreement.  Just as typically, the landlord reveals that the Postal Service really wasn’t interested in renewing the lease to begin with.
This happens all the time.  Over the past few days, three more cases have been reported in the media — in New Canaan, Connecticut; Aripeka, Florida, and Chattanooga, Tennessee.  The stories are strikingly similar,  see more

On Wednesday September 18th, a Community Meeting has been scheduled from 5PM till 7PM at the Aripeka Community Center located at 1393 Osowaw Blvd Spring Hill Florida 34607  Please be sure that you attend this meeting and SPEAK UP to get YOUR mail delivered to YOUR home or at least to YOUR community!

By the way, for the 189 or so households located in Aripeka on the Pasco County side, please note that the meeting is taking place at the Aripeka Community Center, in Aripeka, oh I mean Spring Hill, where mail in delivered curbside daily, except Sunday!  All of Aripeka deserves the same services from the USPS.  Demand your rights!

Everyone, read the papers sent to you by the USPS, note that the USPS is listing the Hudson Post Office as 9.9 miles from the Aripeka Post Office location and the Spring Hill Post is closer at only 9.7 miles away!  I don't think anyone really cares which Post Office delivers mail to us or what Zip Code we have to use to get our mail delivered, just that it is delivered.  It seems must more sensible for our mail to be delivered from Spring Hill since the Spring Hill Post Office delivers mail to as close as Norfleet's Store between bridges in Aripeka.  Norfleet's Store is located only a few hundred feet from the now closed Aripeka Post office.

At Aripeka West, I have already had a couple of our residents report that they could not find the Hudson Post Office.  I can see how this could happen since the Hudson Post Office is not visible from US 19 and if you are going there from Aripeka, it requires a hazardous U-Turn on US 19 in a curve to turn on to the street leading back to the Post Office.

Read comments about the Hudson Post Office, it looks like they have not gotten too many "stars" in the last few years!