Angie Craig seeks public comment on long delays in mail deliveries

(ABC 6 News) – People across Minnesota have been experiencing delays in getting their mail from the United States Postal Service for months. And now a Minnesota representative wants to hear more about those issues to work to find a solution.

According to Rep. Angie Craig the postal service says they things are running smoothly, but that’s not what she been hearing. The congresswoman says she’s been getting hundreds of calls over the last several weeks with people complaining about slow delivery.

Rep. Craig sent a letter to Postmaster General Louis Dejoy on December 30th asking about the problems some of her constituents have been having. She says she has yet to receive a response.

So now she’s asking people to fill out a survey about mail problems. She wants to send those responses to the postmaster, to bring more awareness to the issue.

“I want a broader view of what happening with my constituents on what’s happening with their postal service. More than that it’s an opportunity to partner with USPS to make sure they got the federal resources they need to serve my constituents,” said Rep. Craig.

Happy that someone from congress is working on the issue Kaye Willis of Rochester said, “Absolutely that’s their job that why we elected them.”

Representative Craig said many people have also been complaining that when they call the post office to ask where their mail is or why it’s showing up late, they are on hold for hours.

Kaye Willis says even here in Rochester they have experienced delays. “Just that my packages from amazon have been delayed two to three days, but other than that its current now. But in the past, it was like five o clock before we’d get our mail in northeast,” said Willis.

Just last week Senator Amy Klobuchar also addressed this issue pleading with USPS officials to fix the problem.

Craig says one of the reasons for the issues is staffing shortages. She’s hopeful that bring more awareness to the problem will encourage more people to apply for jobs with USPS.

“Now there have been some improvements in some areas, some of it is weather-related and we understand that, but we have to have consistent mail service,” Klobuchar said.

You can take the USPS survey until February 3rd.