Hampden postal employees fear downsizing over loss of sorting machine

6 years ago

A decision by the U.S. Postal Service to move a sorting machine from Hampden to Scarborough has local employees worried they’re about to be downsized.

But a Postal Service official said the decision isn’t a reflection of imminent job loss, rather a response to a need for more sorting services in southern Maine.

The mail sorting machine will be moved as soon as next month from the U.S. Postal Service’s Eastern Maine Processing and Distribution Center in Hampden to the state’s only other processing facility in Scarborough.

In 2012, the future of the plant was threatened with a nationwide consolidation plan. Then, U.S. Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe successfully drafted eleventh-hour legislation to keep the facility open, later securing a promise from the former postmaster general that the facility would remain open for another two years.

Hampden employees and American Postal Workers Union members have asked Collins to intervene again. A dozen employees met with a member of Collins’ staff on Wednesday at her office in the Margaret Chase Smith Federal Building.

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