EL PASO COUNTY, Colo. — Neighbors north of Colorado Springs felt like they were left in the dark last week when their cluster mailbox disappeared.
A man who lives out of state reached out to News5 asking for help because his 88-year-old mother was one of the people unsure of what happened when she went to pick up her mail on Jan. 10.
"The mailbox was gone, there was no notice, no anything," Jean Reinman explained. "It was just missing. And I thought, how could a mailbox this large... be missing?"
The cluster mailbox serves about a dozen residents in the neighborhood along Ridgefield Lane in the Gleneagle area north of Colorado Springs. Jean wanted to know what happened and who was responsible for replacing the mailboxes.
When News5 went to the neighborhood earlier this week, several people walking by had the same questions. Some tried to get answers through the United States Postal Service (USPS), others weren't impacted and were just curious.
"I thought the postman would have said something to anyone, but it kind of was just a question all through the neighborhood, no one knew," Reinman explained. "I assumed that the post office knew, but I had no idea there was no message."
News5 reached out to a spokesperson for USPS and received a quick response. The spokesperson explained the mailboxes were damaged and reported to them by the Colorado Springs Police Department on January 10. The mail had been removed and was available for pickup in the Briargate Post Office about 12 miles away.
"The boxes are Postal owned and a work order to replace the boxes has been submitted," the spokesperson wrote to News 5. "We do not have an ETA on the timeline of replacement currently."
One question had been answered for Reinman and others, but the evidence of what had happened to the mailboxes was still apparent. There were tire tracks in the snow coming from the driveway of a nearby house leading straight to where the mailbox once stood. News5 learned Colorado State Patrol was called to the residence on the night of Jan. 9.
"A 2015 Kia Sorento was stopped on a sloped driveway," Trooper Sherri Mendez with the Colorado State Patrol wrote." The driver of the Kia Sorento stepped out of the Kia. The Kia began to roll backward. The driver of the Kia attempted to get back into the vehicle and fell down. The Kia Sorento rolled over the driver's arm causing minor injuries. The Kia continued to roll backward and collided into a USPS multi-unit mailbox."
The driver was cited for parking a vehicle without setting brakes. While the mystery was solved, Reinman and her neighbors are still frustrated over the situation as they wait for important documents during tax season. Reinman is also waiting to get her brother's death certificate as she tries to handle his estate hundreds of miles away. Some neighbors News5 spoke with said that some of their mail that was supposed to be delivered by now has not been at the Briargate Post Office.
On Wednesday, the USPS spokesperson said he expects the mailbox to be replaced very soon and asked that those impacted just keep up those lines of communication. The spokesperson added if you can't get your answers over the phone or in person, you can also email by clicking this link. USPS manages many cluster mailboxes, but there are others they don't, so in some situations USPS may not be responsible for replacing a damaged or missing unit.
Reinman doesn't blame USPS for the issue that was caused by a careless driver, but she still feels like the communication could have been better.
News5 will update this article when we find out when the cluster mailbox is replaced.
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