Northfield bids to keep post office downtown

Trying to save their endangered downtown post office, Northfield officials have sent a letter offering to buy the historic landmark for $1 and give the U.S. Postal Service free space to continue providing retail service there.

The Postal Service, trying to staunch its chronic losses in the Internet age, told the city on April 5 that it intended to sell the imposing limestone-and-brick edifice, built in 1936. Stamp and other retail sales would be moved to a postal annex about two miles from downtown.

The Save Our Post Office Task Force, an ad hoc group, came up with the $1 deal and persuaded the city to make the offer, said task force chairman Keith Covey, a former mayor. He said the district Postal Service manager was notified that the letter, signed by Mayor Mary Rossing, would be in the mail by this week.

District Manager Anthony Williams said he extended the city's 60-day response period past the June 5 deadline to give city officials time to make their proposal.

Would he sell to the city?

"It depends on what the circumstances are," said Williams, whose district covers most of Minnesota and western Wisconsin. He said 29 of the district's 850 post offices are to be closed this year, and Northfield, Plymouth, Minnetonka, Cottage Grove and five others will consolidate services with other stations.

Williams said last week that the government still plans to sell the Northfield station "unless the city provided something else that would create an alternative that would be best." He said he expects to respond soon to the city's offer.

Northfield's offer could be a win-win because the Postal Service could save the $75,000 a year it spends on utilities and maintenance at the downtown station as well as more than $300,000 to upgrade the annex for retail sales, Covey said. He said the station earned more than $800,000 in gross revenues last year, some of which would disappear if retail service were moved to the inconvenient annex.

'Let's keep talking'

Covey said he hopes that Williams will keep talking "even if they don't agree with our initial offer."

If the city buys the station, he said, it would move quickly to sell the building to a private developer. The developer would make needed upgrades and could lease more than 5,000 square feet beyond the approximately 2,000 square feet needed for the post office.

"It's such a gorgeous historic building and a keystone to downtown," said Mayor Rossing. "We can certainly put in an offer and see what the post office does. ... There's a lot of 'ifs' there, but it may actually make sense to the Postal Service."

Covey said that besides drawing about 400 potential shoppers a day downtown when it's open, the post office serves about 250 businesses and 400 residents located within a half-mile. He said nearly 1,000 residents have signed petitions to keep the post office, and Minnesota's two U.S. senators and the area congressman have been helpful in the city's efforts to save it.

The two-story building is also part of the downtown area designated as a national historical district in the 1980s, Covey said. That has drawn another city ally into the fray -- the Minnesota Historical Society.

The society, acting as the State Historic Preservation Office, has informed the Postal Service that sale of the post office "would have an adverse effect" on the building and its surrounding historic commercial district. The district, including the post office, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, said society compliance manager Mary Ann Heidemann.

The Postal Service has been slow to follow the process required by the National Historic Preservation Act to minimize adverse effects, Heidemann said. Her office can't stop the sale, she said, but the law says no sale can occur until the Postal Service consults with interested parties, including the city and its preservation commission, to hear options to avoid or minimize the negative impact of selling the station.

Postal Service spokesman Pete Nowacki said his agency will follow the required consultation process before any sale occurs. The agency "will work with the consulting parties to satisfy their concerns," he said.

Northfield has been more active than most cities facing loss of their post office, Williams said. "Everybody wants things to keep the status quo," he added.

Rossing said she is "cautiously optimistic about retaining post office business downtown."

Jim Adams • 952-707-9996