TINY HARMONY POST OFFICE SET TO CLOSE FRIDAY

A big change for 93435

The U.S. Postal Service says the building is unsafe; for now, residents will get their mail in a cluster mailbox down the street

By Kathe Tanner

When the tiny Harmony post office closes at 1 p. m. Friday, it will interrupt more than 90 years of continuous postal service.

Since 1914, the post office — little more than a bank-style window and 102 antique postal boxes in the Harmony Creamery building — has offered customers more than mail, stamps and package shipping.

It’s been a makeshift town hall and impromptu meeting place for the 98 boxholders and anyone else wanting to buy a stamp, mail a letter or ask directions in the hamlet where the official population is 18.

A decade ago, the U.S. Postal Service threatened to close the office because it wasn’t profitable. This time, a postal service representative says the branch will stop offering services because the building it’s in is “structurally unsafe.”

Volunteer Harmony historian Aarika Wells said she’s “just sick about it. It’s disheartening and disgusting. Everybody who comes into the post office now leaves in tears.”

A letter from Dan Scofano, a postal service manager in Santa Clarita, informed customers in the 93435 ZIP code that beginning Saturday a rural carrier will deliver Harmony residents’ mail to a “cluster mailbox.” That is a freestanding metal box divided into smaller, individually keyed boxes. As

of Monday, the postal service hadn’t yet installed the cluster mailbox under a streetlight a half-block from the post office.

The postal service letter said the tentative change “will not lead to a formal proposal” to close the branch “unless we conclude that it will provide a maximum degree of regular and effective postal services.”

For now, no notice of permanent closure of the Harmony post office has been made. But residents say there are rumors that the tiny office in the historic building was losing money and won’t reopen.

Phone calls to postal representatives about the fiscal performance of the office were not returned Monday.

According to a Web site run by an association of postmasters, www.napus.org, before closing a post office, public notice of the proposed closure must be made, followed by a 60-day comment period. Postal authorities have an unspecified amount of time to make a decision. Following a public notice of the decision, there are 30 days to file an appeal, which must be decided within 120 days.

Even if no appeal is filed, the post office must remain open for at least 60 days from announcement of a decision.

In the past, public outcry played a role in causing the postal service to back down after threatening to close the office.

Closure was considered in 1995, ironically the same year the office won an award for the best budget performance among a dozen offices of similar size.

The community of Harmony began in 1869 as a cheese factory serving local dairymen.

In addition to Harmony’s official population of 18, many more people live on ranches in surrounding areas. The 2.5-acre “downtown” commercial district has been privately owned for decades. The town’s primary attractions are a winery, pottery shop, rustic history and rural landscape.

“It’s definitely a bummer,” said Derrick Tartaglia, Harmony resident and grandson of former town Postmaster June Tartaglia. “It’s a sad thing.”