By Geoff Smith

Municipalities preparing for possible mail strike

Jun 28, 2016 | 11:14 AM

Cities and towns could be affected in a number of ways, should a strike or lockout take place at Canada Post.

Either could take place as soon as July 2, should the corporation fail to reach an agreement with the Canadian Union of Postal Workers (CUPW). In such an event, Canada Post is advising the public there will be no delivery of mail or parcels already in the system, and new mail will not be accepted.

Diana Burton, city manager for Meadow Lake, hopes any disruption will be a short one. She said quarterly utility bills are due to be sent in early July but aren’t due until late August. She encouraged people to pick up their bills at City Hall or to sign up for e-billing.

A more pressing concern are property taxes, which are due at the end of July.

“We will be asking people to try out alternate methods,” she said. “For instance, if you do online banking with a branch that is local to Meadow Lake, you can pay via online banking. If you do your banking through a bank that we don’t have a local branch, you can actually do it by telephone banking. If you live in Meadow Lake you can come down and make your payment directly to us.”

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She added council was scheduled for its June 27 meeting to discuss whether to make any changes to the penalties, which normally would begin to accrue Aug. 2.

The town of Battleford was considering some different measures, according to John Enns-Wind, chief administrative officer. He said those could include alternate pickup locations for bills and tax notices, having students working summer jobs deliver the notices, or extended hours at town hall. However, nothing is decided yet.

He also said the town’s new computer system could accommodate emailed notices. But he doubted it would be running in time.

“We’re set up for (electronic bill payments) so they can go to their banks. But what they need to know is, how much is my bill?” Enns-Wind said.

At the same time, both Burton and Enns-Wind said the strike could also affect their respective municipalities’ ability to pay its own bills to vendors.

“This would be an opportunity, perhaps, to do more electronic fund transfers and things like that,” Enns-Wind explained.

The city of North Battleford said late Monday that a July 2 work stoppage would not immediately affect it, because utility bills and tax notices have already been sent. However, if it lasted more than a month the city would have to deliver the next bills itself.

In a June 27 news release, Canada Post said yesterday was the last day it could guarantee delivery of a regional expedited parcel before a possible work stoppage. Local parcels and Priority parcel service could be sent as late as June 29.

On June 23, a spokesperson from the postal workers’ union said talks were still continuing, and the union couldn’t say what would happen on July 2. In a message to its members union staff said they would need to work together to protect jobs and public services.

Union staff also said that in the event of a strike or lockout, a deal was in place to ensure delivery of pension and social assistance cheques, as well as any live animals already in the mail system.

Geoff Smith is battlefordsNOW’s News Director, business and agriculture reporter. He can be reached at gsmith@jpbg.ca or tweet him @smithco. Concerns regarding this story can be addressed to Geoff at 306-446-6397.