Mail Distribution Center May Move

Sun., Feb. 23, 1997

Virginia De Leon Staff writer

Last-minute mail may take a trip west.

The city’s main distribution center - where the last pickup is at 9:30 p.m. - may move from its 703 E. Trent location, U.S. Postal Service officials said.

Although the move still needs to be approved by the postal service’s Board of Governors, officials are looking at a site near the Spokane International Airport, said LeRoy Nielsen, manager of field maintenance operations in Spokane.

The proposed site - located at the top of Sunset Hill - would be more convenient for mail that’s being transported to and from Seattle, he said.

The post office also has outgrown its current main distribution center, said Al DeSarro, a Denver-based, Western-area spokesman for the postal service.

The current plant covers 150,000 square feet, he said. To accommodate operations, the post office needs a facility twice that size, he said.

Right now, the 426 employees who work at the Trent facility handle about 2 million pieces of mail a day, DeSarro said.

“We’re doing this to better serve Spokane,” Nielsen said. “We want to be quicker and more efficient.”

If a new distribution center is built, the post office also plans to close its priority mail facility at 805 N. Hamilton and move it to the new plant.

The Board of Governors should make a decision by the end of the year, DeSarro said.

In the meantime, Gonzaga University, owner of the property next door, wants to buy the current post office site.

The 15-plus-acre site not only would accommodate three future academic buildings, but would provide a south entrance to the campus, said GU public relations director Dale Goodwin.

, DataTimes

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