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Politics & Government

Sleepy Hollow Speaks on Behalf of Its Post Office Branch

There was a good turn-out at Sleepy Hollow's meeting to save the post office, but will it make a difference?

U.S. Post Office officials kept assuring the crowd at Thursday night’s community meeting that their review of the Sleepy Hollow Branch is epidemic not specific. The branch is part of the 3,700 nationally , along with many more to come, stemming from huge fiscal losses affecting the whole operation. But to residents who filled the Village Hall room and spoke passionately on the topic, it is very personal.

The blue-suited Richard Ferarri representing the Westchester district of USPS said, “It’s not about Sleepy Hollow verses another post office. It’s about us existing altogether.”

To this sentiment, Sleepy Hollow Trustee Karin Wompa, who has been elemental in taking the battle to save the Beekman branch this far, later countered:  “It sounds selfish, but it’s just a fight for them to pick someone else and not us,” Wompa said. “That’s what it comes down to.”

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Leading up to this meeting has been a petition amassing 2,400 signatures, letters to politicians, and pleading with the powers that be. Thursday’s meeting provided yet another forum for the community to express itself, whose voices USPS promises they will heed in their investigation. Citizens also have up to January 4 to complete a survey of their postal use habits (mailed to residents, and available at the branch), write more letters, and to contact the Westchester office completing the study.

Mildred Carroll, an elderly resident of Kendall-on-Hudson stood up front the front rows and read from her composed letter: “The Tarrytown post office does not serve my needs as a handicapped person. I don’t care about the zip code. I know that’s a big issue, not to us.”

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Peter Zegarelli noted that he was not handicapped, not a senior “yet,” but that he uses the post office extensively to mail packages to his son stationed in Afghanistan, adding up to a ton in the last six months. “ It’s easier to carry heavy packages here,” he said.

Maria Dimilia-Powers, a lifelong resident, spoke from the back of the room with her well-researched analysis. “What a post office is a service to a municipality,” she said. “It’s not a business. It can’t always make money.”

Among many other voices was Irene Amato, who said, “I’ve lived in this village my whole life. No one’s going to go to Tarrytown. Tarrytown people come here.”

And there was Baiba Pinnis, who agreed there’s never a shortage of customers here, listing off other post offices not on the at-risk list, in towns numbering only a few hundred citizens. If this branch closed, she said, “to be honest with you, I’d spend my money at UPS.”

The community spoke, but whether this makes any difference has yet to be seen. Mayor Ken Wray couldn’t predict the prospects for this post office.  “The postal reps weren’t taking any stand. They weren’t tipping their hand at all,” he said. “It would only be good news for us if we weren’t on the list. We will continue the efforts that Karin Wompa has guided so well. She’s the one who deserves the credit.”

Wompa both mediated the meeting and spoke intermittently on various key points. She questioned the figures – with supposed annual operating costs at $398,000 and revenue at $433,000 at this branch – the USPS can’t argue that it’s losing money here.

Based on these figures, “I honestly don’t think the decision was a revenue-based one,” Wompa said. “I think someone in a Washington office saw two post offices in the same zip code in close proximity; what looks like a no-brainer on paper, in reality is very different. These branches serve two distinct communities and meet different needs.”

Wompa, as did others, stressed Sleepy Hollow’s unique demographics: an older, poorer population including more immigrants, more handicapped. A population that uses less computers, less cars. They rely on the post office for mail orders “because they don’t pay bills on their computer.”

There are 500 post office boxes at the branch that would have to be relocated – a figure the Tarrytown branch reportedly can’t accommodate.

Sleepy Hollow’s population is also a growing one. Census figures show a 7.89 percent population increase since 2000. Add to this the prospected growth – up to one-third, according to the Mayor – when the GM lot gets developed with its 1,100 residential units, along with the 44 units slated for the Castle Oil site.

Some speakers in the room were optimistic that if USPS officials wait just a year, this development would make the answer clear that Sleepy Hollow requires its own post office. (The Mayor later noted that a completed GM site, though closer than ever to coming to fruition, is still many years down the road). Another citizen suggested that both branches in Tarrytown and Sleepy Hollow could then close and relocate to the new GM development.

In the meantime, the USPS will further assess. Wompa said she will be scanning documents to post onto the Sleepy Hollow website for all to peruse, and encouraged people to continue expressing themselves.

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