PORT TOWNSEND — No decisions have been made about fixing accessibility issues facing the historic Port Townsend Post Office, and none is planned in the immediate future.
U.S. Postal Service spokesman Ernie Swanson said in Seattle that accessibility for the disabled at the 115-year-old former Customs House at 1322 Washington St. is “up in the air.”
But Swanson discounted the rumored sale of the building.
“It’s certainly not on the market to be sold,” he said.
“That’s not something we are even considering.”
What the Postal Service has done, however, is place a post office substation in a retail store on Water Street to which the disabled can reach without negotiating steep stairs or being whisked around to a rear loading ramp.
At a Feb. 7 meeting called by the Governor’s Committee on Disability Issues, several community members expressed concern over the rumored sale of the building as well as the inaccessibility of the post office for the handicapped.
The accessibility issue was originally brought up last October when Port Townsend resident Bonnie Bolster collected a petition bearing 940 signatures from residents and filed a complaint under the Architectural Barriers Act of 1968 and the Rehabilitation Act of 1973.
