MN Postmaster Says, "Take Your Unwanted Mail Home!"

Minnesota's Park Rapids Enterprise reports, "Patrons of the Park Rapids post office have noticed something missing lately – the public garbage can. It was removed recently when the postmaster became concerned about identity theft."

Postmaster Denice Phillips-Kunze is quoted in the article as saying, "“I just don’t think it’s a good idea because the trash is overflowing and there’s credit cards – real credit cards in there that you get in the mail. Anybody could activate those. There’s just too much personal information there with the identity theft now I just don’t think that’s a good idea.”

Now postal customers pile their unwanted mail on a counter above where the trash can used to be.

According to reporter Sarah Smith, this poses another problem for the Post Office - when customers dump unwanted mail onto the counters, it could be confused with that “no value” mail the post office is trying to dispose of, too.

“If an inspector comes in and it’s not marked and it’s in the garbage then we get in trouble,” Phillips-Kunze said, “So I would prefer they take their mail home.”

To read the entire article, click here.