Buffalo, NY (WBEN) Local elected leaders joined postal employees for a Friday rally calling on the United States Postal Service to reverse course on moving a mail processing plant to Rochester.
In a letter to the Postmaster General, Congressman Brian Higgins called for Buffalo to be removed from the list, “The relocation of operations from Buffalo to Rochester will result in delayed mail and diminished services,” Higgins wrote. “We are calling on you to immediately remove Buffalo from consideration. The USPS uses language like ‘modernization’ which doesn’t tell the full story of how services will be impacted and ultimately when changes are made it’s too late. If you live in Cheektowaga and send a card to your grandchild in Lackawanna, that mail would go to Rochester first, adding transportation costs and slowing delivery. That’s inefficient and the people of Western New York need to stand up and demand better from the USPS.”
As part of its ten-year strategic plan, ‘Delivering for America’, the U.S. Postal Service is considering a consolidation of mail processing services at facilities across the nation. Buffalo is on a list of 29 sites under consideration. The USPS is reviewing a plan to move some operations currently conducted at the William Street mail processing facility in Buffalo to Rochester. Leaders expressed concerns about the impact this would have on mail delivery in Western New York.