U.S. Postal Officials say there are no staffing issues with the Pacific Palisades Post Office.
Despite complaints by some residents about mail delivery issues in Pacific Palisades, a U.S. Post Office spokesperson says that the local office has sufficient staffing.
A Palisades Optimist Club member told Circling the News that he had not received his mail a day earlier, and when he talked with a local carrier, the carrier said there were staffing issues.
Then we received an email that said, “Last week we did not receive any mail delivery on Tuesday, the day after the Veterans Day holiday [November 11]. Yesterday, Monday, we did not receive our mail delivery until 10:30 p.m. I wonder what’s going on at the Post Office? I wonder if anyone else has had this problem? It’s a little shocking, especially at this time of year.”
Over the next week, people on Nextdoor wrote about Post Office issues. For example:
* “I’m at upper Marquez Knolls, it’s 8 p.m. Wednesday, we haven’t had mail delivered for two days. Anyone has the same problem?”
*“We have had days with no mail and delays down here on Sunset just west of Marquez. Also, a lot of incorrectly delivered addresses.”
*“I spoke to my mailman today. He said there are not enough people delivering mail and even the supervisors have to deliver mail. The person at the top tells the carriers it is not a problem.”
CTN went to the Post Office to send an oversized envelope at 2 p.m. on Wednesday, the second week of November, and there was a line out the door and only one clerk working.
We contacted Congressman Ted Lieu’s office and they responded, “We have had constituents raise concerns over mail delivery issues they’re having with USPS. We work on each constituent case individually and are happy to connect with others who are experiencing issues with the Postal Service. The USPS has assured us that they are looking into these issues and will address constituent concerns around lack of reliable service.”
Lieu’s office put Circling the News in contact with USPS Media Relations executive Evelina Ramirez.
In a November 26 email, Ramirez responded: “Thank you for your email regarding the Pacific Palisades Post Office. As you know, there have been several challenges in this area which may have affected mail delivery, starting with the recent Getty fire. And now we are in the midst of the holiday season which will have our mail carriers hitting the street before the break of dawn throughout the Greater Los Angeles area to get everyone’s packages delivered. Because more people are making online purchases, there are times when our carriers are out later than usual finishing up their deliveries.
“As far as sickness… When we have a route that’s open due to an unanticipated employee absence, deliveries are still made by other letter carriers. Pacific Palisades is not understaffed at this time,” said Ramirez, who noted that Acting Postmaster Nancy Brown has more than 22 years of postal experience. The regular Postmaster, Uco Johnson, who has 20 years of experience, is on another assignment.
“We apologize for your recent experience while trying to mail an envelope,” Ramirez wrote CTN. “Generally, we have two retail window clerks working at all times. We will monitor more closely to insure we have the appropriate number of staff assisting customers.
“Again, we are not understaffed at this location,” she said. “In fact, we just trained another retail window clerk in preparation for the upcoming Christmas holiday.”
We emailed Ramirez back and asked about the people in town who had complained about not receiving their mail. She had not responded by post time. When she responds, we’ll update this post.
We are in upper Marquez, and we have also experienced 2 days of no mail delivery at all, and many days of delivery quite late at night. This started before Thanksgiving, which is before the heavy holiday mail surge. It is frustrating for us, and I am concerned about the effects of all of this on the health of our mail carrier. How in the world can it be said that our post office is not understaffed?
Our complex, 15515 W. Sunset Blvd is the LAST delivery most days at 9:00PM if at all, Monday being the worst. An important weekly magazine that I use in my computer correspondence and pay a hefty price for, sometimes doesn’t appear at all. Something definitely is wrong!!! Not enough hiring?? Not enough sorters??
Lower Marquez gets most of its deliveries after 7 p.m. Only when we get our mail delivered by the older and reliable beared postman do we get it during the day. However, even he makes mistakes and my neighbor is getting tired of walking my mail from his his to mine.
I have also noticed that about every second and third day my first class mail is not delivered but the ad mail is. I have to wonder if they are holding the first class mail and delivering it when it is convenient for them to do so.