Ice Or Snow, Mail Carriers Weather It Despite Policy, They Deliver Even If Walks Not Shoveled
Carrying bundles of sorted mail, a brawny Marvin Brugh followed bootprints he’d left behind in the past couple days and trudged through foot-deep snow, delivering Saturday’s mail with a bearded smile.
It’s rare for Brugh not to deliver mail to one of his 414 customers - even if they haven’t shoveled their walk or driveway.
“I don’t mind the snow,” said the 52-year-old Shadle-Garland post office carrier whom co-workers call “The Polar Bear.” Brugh wears his regulation short-sleeve shirt all year long.
“Goosebumps?” he asks. “I’m sweating out here.”
On a route that’s peppered with steep and slippery hills, Brugh said he’d rather struggle through yards heaped with snow than trek over shoveled sidewalks where ice lurks, waiting to catch him off-balance. He delivers on an eight-mile route bordered on the north by Rowan, on the south by Litchfield, on the west by Driscoll and on the east by A Street.
“Last year, there wasn’t any snow to tromp through,” he said. “It wasn’t as hard then.”
Most carriers, when asked, said they’d deliver to all their customers - even through an ice storm.
But that’s not the official policy of the U.S. Postal Service, whose rulebook says if residents don’t shovel for the carrier, they can forget about having mail delivered.
Mail carriers with foot routes can refuse to deliver mail to homes with ice-crusted walks. Carriers with motor routes can skip homes if they can’t get trucks close enough to the mailboxes. Residents then have to pick up mail at their post office.
Most postmasters around Spokane said the number of people having to pick up mail is very low. Most of them do so because they’ve had mail on hold during vacations.
Out in Otis Orchards, where some residents were without power for more than a week, carriers insisted on working through the storm to make sure people got their mail.
Otis Orchards Postmaster Milly Kropp said her “four awesome carriers” chipped away at ice-glazed mailboxes with their knuckles, dodged downed power lines and even sorted mail by flashlight to get the mail to 2,750 residents.
“When the ice storm hit, no one was prepared,” she said. Almost all the mail was delivered, with the exception of about a 2-foot high stack of mail.
That was delivered first thing the next morning, said Kropp. In Medical Lake, Postmaster Ben Furukawa said the toughest assignment was for carriers with motor routes. “Some people aren’t clearing out their boxes,” he said. “What’s worse is when the county plows or when someone plows their own driveway. The boxes get buried or torn down.”
All of Medical Lake’s routes are rural. The carriers use their own vehicles, usually four-wheel drive trucks, said Furukawa. In winter, the snow and ice just compound the damage the gravel roads inflict on the trucks’ tires, he said. One carrier got a flat tire 31 times in the past three months, he said.
On Saturday, the only slip-up Brugh had was when he tried crossing over a sidewalk slicked with invisible ice.
No matter. He knew what to do.
He brushed off his pants and checked his hands for cuts after he fell into a snowbank. “Ah, well,” he said, crossing the street. “Look for gravel.”
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo
MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: Extended hours A number of Spokane post offices will be open on Saturdays and Sundays through Christmas. The following post offices will be open Saturdays - Dec. 14, 21 - from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Sundays - today, Dec. 15, 22 - from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.: Riverside at 904 W. Riverside Ave. Rosewood at 6325 N. Monroe St. Manito at 3120 S. Grand Blvd. Shadle-Garland at 1903 W. Garland Ave. Regal at 5428 S. Regal St. Hays Park at 3910 N. Crestline Ave. Opportunity at 11712 E. Sprague Ave. Also, today and Dec. 15, letters and cards will be picked up from the blue collection boxes at major arterials throughout the city. A temporary post office will be at the NorthTown Mall for the holidays. It will be open every day through Dec. 21 from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.