An evaluation is currently underway in Penhold to determine what to do about 150 needed mailboxes, a Canada Post spokeswoman said Friday.
“Because this is a growing community … we’ve been trying to keep up essentially,” explained Anik Losier, spokeswoman, who explained the post office has become too small to service everyone in Penhold.
“Before implementing a number of community mailboxes, because these are growing areas, … they are doing an evaluation so we make sure we don’t just have 150 boxes but we plan for the future, so we’re not in the same spot maybe a year from now.”
Losier said a letter was received in April 2011, notifying Canada Post about the issue. She added the evaluation started a few weeks ago.
During council last week, councillors expressed relief that Canada Post was looking into it. Coun. April Jones had mentioned at an Oct. 4 meeting people without boxes were having a hard time getting to the post office during the hours of operation to pick up their mail through general delivery.
On Oct. 18 Coun. Danielle Klooster Tweeted to #CanadaPost, “our community has 150 families on the Canada Post Waiting list for mail boxes. We’ve sent repeated letters asking for more; no response.” Last week she said she heard from Canada Post thereafter that they were looking into it.
“Here’s hoping Twitter wins the day,” said Klooster.
Losier said the delay in getting more mailboxes in is because of the evaluation.
“If it was just a matter of putting in more community mailboxes I would say they’d be in tomorrow,” she said, adding that they need to determine whether to bring in boxes or to move to a bigger facility.
“Is it better to have a bigger and better office? Because if so, it’s a lease, so we need long-term options so these are things we are currently exploring.” If they move, the site would have to be approved by council, she said.
“It’s not optimal,” she said of the current setup for people without boxes. “It’s not what we want or how we want to serve our clients. We are certainly mindful that we need to fix this. It’s just going to take a little while longer. The population is just booming.” Losier couldn’t offer a timeline of when the evaluation will be complete, but added she was looking into it.
