Renfrew residents frustrated after extended post office closure, no explanation

Flooding last month covered the entire Main Street area of Renfrew, Butler County.

A note on the post office door says it had to close for repairs on April 17.

Now, more than a month later, it’s still closed.

“I don’t know what the hold up is,” Renfrew resident Leroy Bunyan told Channel 11.

It’s a big deal for residents who live close by. They do not get mail delivered to their homes.

“For 40-some years I’ve been here, 50 years, you come down to the post office and get your mail,” Bunyan explained. “That’s just the way it works. We’re in the country.”

So, for the last five weeks, residents have had to drive to downtown Butler to get their mail from that post office.

“If you need your mail every day, it’s five miles, six miles each way into Butler to go to the Post Office, get your mail, and drive back here. You’re putting 12 miles on your car every day to get your mail,” Bunyan said.

A statement from a postal service spokesperson, Mark Lawrence, said, “The facility is currently in the repair stage with no set date for reoccupancy. We appreciate customers’ patience and understanding during this time.”

But residents are growing impatient.

“I’ve been fighting it ever since, tooth and nail, after two weeks in when they didn’t do anything. They came out and gutted the bad stuff out and closed it up and said goodbye,” said resident Bill McDonough. “They haven’t done nothing down there, that I’ve seen.”

“It’s a big issue for people that they have to drive in and get their mail every day,” added Bunyan. “The fact that you have a lot of elderly in this neighborhood that are 80, 85 years old and for them to have to go into Butler every day and get their mail, it’s not right.”

According to Lawrence, there’s currently no timetable for when the post office will reopen.

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