Confusion over ZIP codes in Birchdale results in more than just lost mail

MELISSA TOWNSEND: Let's head to far northern Minnesota now. Birchdale, Minnesota, is an unincorporated community, just about a mile south of the Canadian border, as the crow flies. It's small, but it does have its own zip code, or it used to. And it may still, but it's very unclear. And that's causing some trouble for the residents there. Here to explain what's going on is Robert Hopwood. He's a reporter for Northern Light Region newspaper. Welcome to Minnesota Now, Robert.

ROBERT HOPWOOD: Hi. Thank you for having me.

MELISSA TOWNSEND: Yeah. Thanks for being here. So when we say that Birchdale is small, can you tell me, what's the population?

ROBERT HOPWOOD: You know, I haven't been able to find that out. I've looked on the Census Bureau's website, and they don't seem to have done a census count of the community. And I don't want to venture a guess, because I'm not that familiar. There's so many back roads, and it's a large area, but it is very small.

MELISSA TOWNSEND: Very small, OK, and for years, the residents were able to address their letters Birchdale, Minnesota, 56629, but then that changed. So tell us what happened.

ROBERT HOPWOOD: Well, according to the Postal Service, in 2011, they told Birchdale residents-- they asked them to start using the Baudette as the city designation, and that zip code 56623, because the mail was being delivered out of Baudette. And it seems to have-- some people were allowed to use Birchdale, but then the post office seems to have cracked down on that. And then mail started to be returned, according to some residents, if it had Birchdale in the address or if it used 56629. And there's a lot of confusion about when the Postal Service started to crack down on this.

MELISSA TOWNSEND: OK. So at some point, they were told to use the Baudette zip code. Some did, some didn't, and now suddenly, they're not getting their mail. Do they know why they're not getting their mail?

ROBERT HOPWOOD: Well, they're getting their mail if they use Baudette 56623. They're not getting their mail if they use a Birchdale as the city designation, which some have been told they could do. But also another problem is that, apparently, some residents say that there are a lot of systems that don't mesh with the Postal Service's address, the way that they want them to address it.

And so some of these address systems will not send the mail to Baudette. They still address it to Birchdale. Those letters won't be delivered.

And residents also say that, occasionally, when they get mail, if it uses Birchdale, or 56629, the Postal Service will put a sticker on their mail saying, please, change your address. And they have to constantly call up companies, where like, oh, you moved. And then they have to explain, no, we didn't move, and it's just a hassle for them.

MELISSA TOWNSEND: No, indeed. Yeah. So not getting your mail can create a lot of problems, especially if these are official documents, banks, tax forms, et cetera. And I understand Senators Klobuchar and Smith have both taken action. What have they done?

ROBERT HOPWOOD: Senator Klobuchar contacted the Postal Service, and they agreed to allow Birchdale residents to use Birchdale as the city designation. So instead of saying Baudette 56623, Birchdale residents could put Birchdale 56623. It's still that's zip code, but they can at least use their community's name. A lot of them don't like that, and there's a lot of unintended consequence-- a lot of unintended things and problems that can develop doing that. So a lot of them want their zip code back.

It's unclear what Senator Smith did. She released a press release saying that she secured, from the post office, the ability for Birchdale residents to use either town's name as their city designation and either zip code. But she said that on Tuesday, but the US Postal Service came out on Thursday and said, no, that's not correct.

MELISSA TOWNSEND: Oh.

ROBERT HOPWOOD: If you use 56629, we will return your mail. The only people who can use that are people who rent post office boxes in Birchdale from the post office. It's a 56629 is a post office box-only zip code. So they completely contradicted what Smith said, and her office did not even know that happened, until they learned it from me, on Friday.

MELISSA TOWNSEND: So what needs to happen now?

ROBERT HOPWOOD: Well, it depends on who you talk to. If the postal service says, we made this accommodation for the residents. They can use Birchdale. If you talk to the residents, some are OK with that. A lot of them aren't.

A lot of them want 56629 back because, if you go online, for example, and you put 56623, Baudette's zip code, a lot of those automated address systems will say that's a Baudette address. So you can't use Birchdale with it. Also, if you use 56623, some residents are getting jury notices from Lake of the Woods County. They don't live in Lake of the Woods County.

MELISSA TOWNSEND: Oh, wow. OK, lots of problems.

ROBERT HOPWOOD: Yes. Exactly. There's a lot of unintended consequences with those.

MELISSA TOWNSEND: What did Senator Smith's office-- I just have a couple more seconds here. Did she say she was going to follow up on this?

ROBERT HOPWOOD: Yeah. They were furious, I believe, when they found out that the Postal Service contradicted what they said and did not notify them. And if you just give me one second--

MELISSA TOWNSEND: Oh, you're looking for the email or something?

ROBERT HOPWOOD: Yeah. I'm looking for the email. According to Deputy Chief of Staff Ed Shelleby, he said, we have tried to get to the bottom of what happened, and they have not been forthright. If they provided incorrect information to a Senate office, which we use to update the public and do not take responsibility for that error and explain what happened, that is an enormous problem. We are hoping to communicate the gravity of that.

Pete Stauber's office released a statement also about this, and he said-- that's our local Congressman. He said, the USPS has seemingly sent conflicting information to different officials on the Birchdale zip code situation. My office will continue to push the USPS to fix the situation, once and for all, for Birchdale residents. Because Birchdale, like all rural communities, matters.

MELISSA TOWNSEND: And USPS is, of course, the US Postal Service agency.

ROBERT HOPWOOD: Yes.

MELISSA TOWNSEND: Well, thank you, and I'm sorry we don't have more time to talk about this. But we will follow this story and hope for a resolution for these residents. Thanks, Robert. I appreciate it.

ROBERT HOPWOOD: Thank you.

MELISSA TOWNSEND: Robert Hopwood is a reporter for Northern Light Region. He's been covering confusion and frustration over the zip code situation in Birchdale, Minnesota. It's an unincorporated community in the northern edge of the state.