Cluster Boxes

Several years ago the United States Post Office announced that it needed more floor space to operate to accommodate its ever expanding customer base. Consequently, the owner of the West Main Street location acquired a neighboring lot of land hoping to be able to expand that facility. The USPO, not wishing to limit its options also started a search for other sites, some of which were outside the Town limits. If memory serves me, the USPO put all plans on hold due to budgetary concerns which gave the citizens a false sense of security that the USPO would not leave the downtown location.

Then, the beast awoke, and once again the USPO was looking for a larger home. Plans for the downtown site fell through, but an opportunity arose in the uptown area at the Scottsville shopping center. Once again concern arose amongst the residents and business owners in downtown Scottsville about the loss of not only the physical presence of the Post Office but also the convenience of picking up mail.

Because of the proximity of the Post Office to its customers, the USPO did not have to provide rural or city delivery to the downtown area. This required that anyone not getting home delivery had to rent a PO Box. Now that the Post Office is moving out of that area, their own regulations state that they must offer free delivery. Due to the narrowness of the Town’s streets and apparent lack of areas to place mail boxes, the Postal Carriers Union stepped in and decreed that mail delivery by rural carrier was an unsafe proposition, so as a compromise the USPO offered to place “cluster boxes” at a location in the downtown area.

Upon learning this I contacted the Mayor and made some suggestions about location so as to make it more convenient to the eventual patrons of these boxes. As usual, the Mayor brushed off my suggestions. It seems he had already worked out an arrangement with the USPO to have the boxes placed in the parking lot adjacent to the farmers market. Despite this, I continued to lobby on behalf of the citizens of Scottsville to have the boxes placed in a safe and convenient location.

Because of the delays with Streetscape, the Mayor’s site for the boxes was consumed by the presence of gravel, and machinery most of 2007 so no work could be done to prepare for the placement of 160 boxes. As the site was being also considered for a permanent structure for the farmer’s market, I suggested that an architect, instead of the landscape architect they had used,  be retained to look at the entire site and incorporate the market building, the VFW memorial, the parking, and the cluster boxes into one coherent plan. After several months the Town did secure the services of a certified architect, but when he presented his plans to the Town’s Architectural Review Board there was no mention of the cluster boxes. The ARB had never seen the Mayor’s plan for the boxes even though they would be placed in the Historic District. Any and all private activities in the district must receive approval from the ARB before being approved  and it would appear the Mayor circumvented the review of the ARB either by design or ignorance.

At this point the ARB asked for a review of the cluster box placement in the Historic District. After discussion with the Government Services Committee, there now seems to be a consensus that the boxes are inappropriate for placement in the Historic District as they are currently designed. They also looked at other sites and considered safety aspects as well.

Sadly for the the citizens of Scottsville, a open discussion about these boxes came at the same time as when the Post Office started the process of moving.  Although home delivery is much more preferred, in fairness to the USPO, they thought the issue was a done deal and had the boxes available for placement and all they needed was the concrete slab on which to place them. It is my understanding, unlike that of the Mayor as quoted in a recent article in the Daily Progress, it is not a matter of money for rural delivery, but a lack of funding for a city carrier. These are two different forms of mail delivery and apparently not understood by the Mayor.

At the last Council meeting, the Mayor was instructed to contact Congressmen Virgil Goode about home delivery again either either by rural or city carrier. Other than that, no action was taken to resolve the issue although there was a lot of discussion by council who are concerned by the current situation. In the meantime, everyone who had thought they would have free delivery at long last, had to pay up for continued use of their PO Boxes. The fact that the ARB was not consulted at the very beginning of this process years ago has ended up costing the community more money and added frustration over the loss of the Post Office. Just like other projects in the Town, the current debacle is the result of poor planning by the Town, poor use of the ARB, and the inability to receive and use input of community citizens.

According to the Mayor, the current state of Streetscape is the result of seven years of planning. It now now seems the current mess with mail delivery is the result of a similar planning process although this time only a couple of years were used. To their credit, several Town Council members have now recommended that an Oversight Committee be established to work on all future projects.