Protesters call out post office closure amid open house event

TOPEKA, Kan. (WIBW) - A recent post office closure is leaving many concerned in Topeka and they took their search for answers to an open house.

A celebration for the US Postal Service inside Topeka’s Northwest Gage Boulevard facility drew a protest outside.

Customers and workers wanted to know why the downtown post office closed without warning.

“Well oh my goodness, you get an hour and 15-minute notice before we’re going to close and then all these customers that have been there 20 plus years (most of them), they can’t get their mail and they have to drive all the way out here. No buses come out here. The general delivery they can’t come out here. there are no buses to bring these people out here to get their mail,” says Catherine, Hackett-Brown, President at the American Postal Workers, Local 270.

A notice appeared on the doors at the South Kansas Avenue location over the weekend stating the office was being remodeled, creating slip, trip and fall hazards, plus lead and asbestos were identified.

“The owner had no idea and they didn’t know that we were going to be closing down, so it was all thrown on us and we didn’t have any idea what was going on,” says Penny Oliver, KS Postal Worker’s Vice President.

Postal service officials were at the Northwest Gage facility for an open house on the new sorting and delivery center opening there.

They say the gathering was for invited guests only. We were not allowed inside.

USPS previously told us no offices will be closed, services will not change and no employees will be laid off as a result of the S&DC initiative.

protesters say they have doubts and just want transparency.

“It’s just a shame that Postmaster Dejoy will get rid of the post office for the public and displace the employees not only that but the elderly who have to go travel farther who might not even have a vehicle to get their prescriptions now,” says Oliver.

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