Las Vegas, NV — Craig Colton was named the new postmaster for the United States Postal Service’s Las Vegas Post Office and will take office August 28, 2010 according to a USPS spokesperson. As postmaster, Colton will be responsible for all mail delivery, customer service and retail operations in Las Vegas.

The Postal Service in Las Vegas employs more than 1500 people, working in 23 branches and stations. Each week Las Vegas delivery operations process and deliver mail to an average of 598,000 business and resident addresses. There are approximately 930 delivery routes in the city. Each Las Vegas mail carrier delivers to an average of just over 600 addresses per day.

“Las Vegas is significant in both size and stature,” Colton says. “A top-notch city deserves top-notch service and I will work with all Las Vegas employees to provide that service.”

Colton began his postal career as a letter carrier in Garden Grove, CA, in 1976. After rising through the ranks at various California Post Offices, he became Henderson’s Valle Verde Station Manager in 1997, Postmaster of North Las Vegas in 2000, Postmaster of Henderson, NV in 2005 and Senior Post Office Operations Manager in 2008, covering all of Southern Nevada. He also previously served as Nevada state president and national vice president of the National Association of Postmasters of the United States.

Colton is the 14th postmaster of Las Vegas.

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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.