HEALDSBURG, CA — The U.S. Postal Service’s Carrier Annex at 160 Foss Creek Circle is smoking with activity, but not the kind it wanted. After the loss of the downtown retail and Post Office Box station in a devastating fire, Postal Service employees, led by Postmaster Joe Machado, made rapid adjustments to set up Post Office Box and retail services at the annex for customers of the Center Street station.

An emergency shipment of stamp stock has been received, with all stamps available for customers. Passports also are available and appointments to complete and submit applications are being accepted. Delivery and mail collection have remained unchanged.

The Healdsburg Post Office at Center Street, once rising one block from the very heart of downtown for more than 40 years, is no more. Firefighters responded to the four-alarm blaze as fire burned the 1960s building, leaving little of the structure intact.

Now, flowers, placed by community members, dot the charred landscape with color. Citizens of Healdsburg, where “everybody is a friend,” have come together to mourn the devastation of the Post Office building where they often met to socialize. They shared memories. They received information about where they could pick up mail at the downtown annex.

One of the cherished artifacts of the Center Street Post Office is the old-fashioned bronze Post Office Boxes, and when San Francisco District Manager Rosemarie Fernandez learned that many of the box holders had the same box for 40 years, she understood the meaning of a lasting memory.

“I know our Healdsburg customers are devastated by the loss of their Post Office,” said Fernandez. “There is not much that remains but a memory, but for many the PO Box door serves as a lasting link to that Post Office. Therefore, I have asked Postmaster Joe Machado to salvage as many of the PO Boxes as possible so that I can present them to the original box holders as a keepsake. As soon as we can enter the building safely and salvage the P0 Boxes, I will have the Postmaster notify each box holder personally on how to get the keepsake.

“While ash and debris is all that remains of the downtown Post Office, one thing does not change - the value of caring and sharing, and our promise to continue to provide the very best of postal services.”

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A self-supporting government enterprise, the U.S. Postal Service is the only delivery service that reaches every address in the nation, 150 million residences, businesses and Post Office Boxes. The Postal Service receives no direct support from taxpayers. With 36,000 retail locations and the most frequently visited website in the federal government, the Postal Service relies on the sale of postage, products and services to pay for operating expenses. Named the Most Trusted Government Agency five consecutive years and the sixth Most Trusted Business in the nation by the Ponemon Institute, the Postal Service has annual revenue of more than $68 billion and delivers nearly half the world’s mail. If it were a private sector company, the U.S. Postal Service would rank 28th in the 2009 Fortune 500.