Concerned residents of the Deer Harbor area have formed a Committee to Save the Deer Harbor Post Office in the face of termination of the current lease on the existing building and the potential loss of mail delivery altogether.

“A post office is an essential part of every small community and Deer Harbor’s is no exception,” Howard Barbour, chairman of the committee, said. “Here the post office not only guarantees easily accessible mail services but also functions as a community center for all residents and particularly for those individuals who, because of age or poor health, cannot undertake the 20-mile round trip to Eastsound. The post office is an asset that the Deer Harbor community cannot afford to lose.”

The Deer Harbor Post Office is located within the Deer Harbor Resort, which is now owned by TrendWest Corporation. When TrendWest expressed its determination not to renew its lease with the United States Postal Service, a small group of Deer Harbor residents met last fall and identified four alternative sites.

In November 2008, these community members wrote a letter to the Property Department of the United States Postal Service, inviting the department to inspect the four sites and determine their suitability for a post office facility. The property department responded that the Deer Harbor Post Office was part of a nation-wide study into the viability of all rural post offices and that the department would make no decision about retaining Deer Harbor postal service until the study was complete – no earlier than mid-summer of 2009.

Threatened with both the non-renewal of the lease and the possible cessation of mail service to the Deer Harbor area, the Committee to Save the Deer Harbor Post Office formally convened on March 8, and is now actively creating databases, recruiting volunteers to assist with mailings, and seeking financial assistance.

Closing the post office would affect 42 business owners, more than 300 box holders, and residents of Crane and Waldron whose use the facility.

The Deer Harbor community has had a post office since 1893 and has defeated two previous attempts to close its USPS branch. For further information, call the committee hotline at 376-6051 or visit www.dhpo.blogspot.com.