Weather | Sports | Forums | Comics | Classifieds | Calendar | Movies
JAN WESNER CHILDSDoes Seminole's mayor live in the city? Yes, but not according to the post office. She wants that changed.
SEMINOLE - Residents have wondered for years why their mailing addresses often say Largo or St. Petersburg.
Now Mayor Dottie Reeder has taken the fight to Washington.
Reeder has asked Rep. C.W. Bill Young, R-Largo, to see if Seminole could have its own post office and separate zip code designations. The Seminole Post Office currently is a branch of Largo's.
Harry Glenn, a spokesman in Young's Washington office, said Friday that the congressman has asked the Postal Service about a possible change but has not received any response.
Reeder last year moved into the Thurston Groves subdivision and was told to use Largo as her mailing address. The neighborhood is near the intersection of 102nd Avenue and Old Ridge Road, still within the Seminole city limits but along a postal service boundary that designates the north side of 102nd Avenue as Largo.
"You know, it's kind of embarrassing the mayor of the city of Seminole is told that she lives in Largo," Reeder said.
Other parts of Seminole have St. Petersburg or even Madeira Beach addresses, according to Gary Sawtelle, a spokesman for the U.S. Postal Service Suncoast District.
The problem isn't unique to this city. A Pinellas Planning Council report from 2002 said that people all over the county often are told to use a city in their mailing address that differs from the city where they live. Sawtelle said that's because the post office draws its boundaries to create the most efficient delivery routes, regardless of municipal lines.
The process becomes more complicated when cities annex new areas, he added.
Pinellas Park tried to create its own Post Office several years ago and was turned down.
In Seminole, it's difficult to determine which neighborhoods are supposed to use a different city in their mailing addresses. Sawtelle and an address management specialist in his office, an address management specialist at the Largo Post Office and Seminole City Manager Frank Edmunds all gave different answers when asked that question.
"Some people think, "Well, how come you don't know where those places are?"' Sawtelle said. "We don't need (to know the city boundaries) in our operations. They're really transparent to us."
Technically, he said, it doesn't matter what city a person writes in an address.
"There is a preferred element, but if the zip code is right, it should be delivered correctly," Sawtelle said.
Reeder, however, said some of her mail was returned to sender when it had Seminole rather than Largo as the city.
And Seminole Fire Chief Daniel Graves said it makes a big difference to firefighters. In Florida, a portion of the fees paid by consumers who hold fire casualty insurance policies is sent to local firefighter pension funds. Grave said the insurance companies dole out that money based on postal city designations - not on fire service boundaries.
So, money paid for fire insurance by people like Reeder goes to the Largo Fire Department's pension fund instead of to Seminole.
Graves said he didn't know how much money was involved. But he said Largo received nearly twice as much of the insurance money last year as Seminole, despite the fact that the two fire districts are identical in size.
- Information from Times files was used in this report.