06.27.14

Hoeven: New Postal Facility in Williston to Open Doors Tuesday, July 1

WILLISTON, N.D. – Senator John Hoeven today announced that a new full-service retail postal facility in Williston will open its doors to customers on Tuesday, July 1 at 9 a.m. United States Postal Service (USPS) Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe approved the facility’s lease in March. Hoeven hosted Donahoe in North Dakota last year to hear from local business and community leaders and local postal employees about challenges to mail delivery in the region. The senator has been working with the postmaster and others on an ongoing basis to improve service to the rapidly growing part of the state.

“We’ve been working hard with the USPS for postal service improvements in North Dakota, especially in western North Dakota,” Hoeven said. “At a meeting with Postmaster General Donahoe last year, our postmaster in Williston suggested creating a new postal facility in the community to improve services. Postmaster Donahoe and I then looked possible areas for a new facility, and earlier this year he approved the lease. We’re grateful that Postmaster General Donahoe listened to our community’s concerns and turned a suggestion into a reality.”

The facility has more than 2,800 new post office boxes, a full service window with three clerks and a self-service kiosk in the lobby which offers customers round-the-clock access to buy stamps, track packages and obtain other services. The facility will be open Monday through Friday from 9:00 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. and from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. on Saturday. The facility occupies a 5,880-square-foot site in the Badlands Town Center located at 4315 9th Ave. W., Unit 411 in Williston.

In addition to Donahoe’s visit in 2013, Hoeven has worked with the USPS to help increase the number of postal employees in the Bakken region and in February the USPS entered into a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the Rural Letter Carriers Association. The MOU took effect last month and granted pay increases and bonuses to recruit and retain rural carriers in Williston, Minot, Dickinson, Watford City and most of the communities in western North Dakota.

“The new facility in Williston is a big step toward improving postal services in western North Dakota, but we still have a ways to go,” Hoeven said. “We will continue to work with postal officials and our fast-growing communities to ensure we have reliable and high quality postal services.”

A formal ribbon cutting ceremony for the new facility is scheduled for August.

The Postal Service has also enacted a number of oil field initiatives to enhance customer experiences including:

  • Expanded customer access to postal products and services with a contract postal unit at a Watford City grocery store and a Village Post Office facility in Tioga
  • Added 460 additional Post Office Boxes in Parshall
  • Added more than 2,000 new delivery points in the region since September 2013
  • Deployed state-of-the-art mobile retail technology – creating simple transactions for customers in the Post Office lobby
  • Established cluster box delivery for residential corporate housing and new developments
  • Established Consumer Advisory Councils in local communities to keep our customers and the community informed and to help address customer concerns
  • Aggressively recruiting new employees and developing strategies to encourage current career employees to transfer to the region
  • Establishing customer relations coordinator and transportation specialist positions to serve the Bakken Oil Field region