TEXARKANA --United States Postal Service officials announced plans to move out of Texarkana's federal building but say they are committed to maintaining an office in downtown Texarkana.
Postal Service spokesman McKinney Boyd said the relocation is expected in the next 15 months.
"The USPS is working with General Services Administration to help them expand the U.S. district courts and [federal] marshals' office that occupy space in that building," Boyd said. "We have our real estate professionals looking at available retail space for a post office in downtown Texarkana, Ark."
Boyd said the USPS was notified by letter from the General Services Administration of the need for the space to accommodate the courts and U.S. Marshals Service offices. The building houses federal court personnel in the Texarkana divisions of the Eastern District of Texas and the Western District of Arkansas.
Boyd said the Postal Service plans involve only relocation, not a shuttering of the office.
"Customers in downtown Texarkana, Ark., will not lose a U.S. Postal Service presence. Postal management is committed to find an alternate location in the downtown area, which will accommodate our employees and serve our customers, in a progressive, new retail environment," Boyd said.
The office is staffed by only one full-time employee. In 2011, Texarkana lost its unique Texarkana, Ark-Tex, postmark when the local mail processing center was merged with one in Shreveport.
Exactly how the space now occupied by the post office will be used is unclear. Calls to the Government Services Administration, which manages the building, were not returned immediately.
Texarkana Mayor Ruth Penney-Bell said she strongly opposes a move from the downtown federal building, the only one in the country that straddles a state line and houses federal courts and a post office that serve two states.
"The historical significance of this is so important to our community," Penney-Bell said. "This is the one place where both sides of the city meet. We come together here."
Penney-Bell said she would prefer the post office remain where it is, even if the square footage of the space it occupies is reduced.
Texarkana Chamber of Commerce President Bill Cork said he was unaware of the proposed post office move and declined to comment.
A post office has operated at that site since at least 1893, according to a historical medallion on the building. Construction on the building that stands there now was completed in 1933, and it has housed a post office since.
State Desk on 03/28/2015