Postal office: Mail may take time to recover

NORTH PORT — The U.S. Postal Service said Friday some delivery delays will take place locally due to Hurricane Milton.

District 2, where Sarasota, Charlotte, and DeSoto counties are located, was the post offices’ most severely impacted district. USPS is broken down into three different districts: Jacksonville, Tampa and Fort Lauderdale/Miami.

District 2 is resuming operations, but full recovery may take time, according to a USPS news release.

Backlogged mail and impacted routes were cited as reasoning in the release.

Local areas using the following three-digit ZIP Code beginnings were hit the hardest, according to USPS.

328-329335-339341-342346-347

The 339 ZIP codes include many Charlotte County communities like Port Charlotte, Punta Gorda, Rotonda West, Murdock, Placida, Grove City, Boca Grande and many Lee County areas. The numbers run from with 33901 to 33994.

The 342 ZIP codes, starting with 34201 in Bradenton, all the way to 34295 in the Englewood area, also include Arcadia, North Port, Sarasota, Venice, Nokomis, Osprey and other communities.

“USPS teams have been dispatched to affected areas where possible and are working to get into other areas which remain inaccessible,” the release stated.

As of Thursday, Oct. 10, all District 2 processing facilities and most retail and delivery units have not reopened yet, the release stated.

“Where retail and delivery units remain inaccessible, we have relocated operations to nearby units and are further deploying mobile retail units to make sure we can provide retail and delivery services to impacted communities as quickly as possible,” the release stated.

USPS shared a breakdown Milton’s local impacts.

295 remain closed are closed; none have reopened.No facilities were destroyed. None of its delivery offices were impacted.There is an estimated backlog of 4,457,641 pieces of mail. Parcels will be delivered when it is safe to do so.All addresses in District 2 are currently unreachable due to displacement and inoperable routes.All estimated routes are currently inoperable.

Replacement vehicles are being sent to local offices that have damaged vehicles.

USPS is working with federal agencies like FEMA to assist in response to the storm that ravaged the region.

Resident resourcesImpacted residents who have been forced to relocate for the long-term should complete a change of address form at moversguide.usps.com{span}.{/span}

Residents in a temporary shelter will see USPS staff onsite this week to assist.

Social Security checks that have arrived are either being delivered or are available for customer pickup.

For service alerts, visit tinyurl.com/yfethprx