Wayzata residents campaign to save their post office

Judy Starkey's garage is a testament to her dedication to saving the Wayzata Post Office.

Stacks of pamphlets, letters and signs are spread across folding tables, evidence of her hard-nosed fight to keep the mail flowing through the historic building.

Despite her efforts, however, the outlook is bleak.

She predicts that "one of these days there will be a 'For Sale' sign plopped on our beautiful post office."

Ever since the notice went up six months ago proclaiming that the U.S. Postal Service was considering selling the building, Starkey and her fellow members of the Heritage Preservation Board have rallied to its defense.

The group sent letters to congressional representatives and collected nearly 1,100 signatures on a petition to keep the building operating as a post office.

Built on the eve of WWII

The Minnetonka Avenue office was built in 1941 under the Works Progress Administration during the Great Depression. Its antique features -- dark mahogany millwork, a green- and rose-colored tile floor, and Mankato marble paneling -- are a striking snapshot of the era.

"It's old," Starkey said. "You wouldn't get anything like that anymore."

Erected at a cost of $70,000, the building is now a hub in the city of Wayzata. Those advocating its preservation say it's always bustling with activity, and even garners use from people who live in neighboring cities.

"It's a pretty popular place," Preservation Board Chairperson Irene Stemmer said.

Board members waved signs and gathered signatures outside the post office throughout September and October.

No decision has been made on the facility's fate, said Peter Nowacki, spokesperson for the Postal Service in Minneapolis. Either way, Wayzata will still have a post office. It would simply relocate, he said.

But local residents say it wouldn't be the same in another location, and they have offered a number of ideas to save the current site.

One option calls for a group of citizens or an organization to purchase the property and lease it back to the Postal Service -- a move the Postal Service has expressed some interest in pursuing.

The property also could be placed under Preservation Easement, in which case the city would purchase it through bonds and lease it to the Postal Service. Buildings under easement are required to stay in their original form as much as possible.

"That's the crème de la crème of preservation," Stemmer said.

A more unlikely scenario offered by local residents would be to have the National Park Service purchase the property and declare it a park or to have the building placed on the National Register of Historic Places.

A matter of history

Bill Berneking, a Wayzata resident for more than 40 years, lives about a quarter-mile from the post office and said he walks there a couple of times a month. While it wouldn't be too much of a hassle for people to use another building, he said, he signed the petition to keep the post office for its symbolic, historical value.

"It's iconic to Wayzata," he said.

Sens. Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken, both Democrats, and Rep. Erik Paulsen, a Republican, all have sent letters to Postmaster General Jack Potter in support of keeping the post office open.

A decline in mail volume has prompted the Postal Service to reduce the number of facilities it operates. Branches in Brooklyn Park, Plymouth and Savage have been put up for sale. Hopkins' post office managed to avoid the "For Sale" list after its fate was questioned.

In the past year, the Postal Service has reduced its offices and employees by at least 15 percent nationwide, shedding 400 facilities and 150,000 employees.

Stemmer, who said passersby would shout support from cars and run over to sign the petition when she stood in front of the building, said, "There's a lot of emotion as far as that post office is concerned."

Tara Bannow is a University of Minnesota student on assignment for the Star Tribune.