Mail not delivered to mailboxes at Linwood Senior Living in 3 months

BUFFALO, N.Y. (WIVB) - Residents at an apartment building in Elmwood Village have good reason to be upset -- they haven't had mail delivered to their mailboxes in three months.

Instead, senior tenants need to travel miles away to pick up their mail -- and they're Calling 4 Action.

It has been a mess for tenants at Linwood Senior Living, located at 333 Linwood -- many of those tenants have no way of physically getting their mail. News 4 is getting an update from the U.S. Postal Service on the situation.

"They haven't been getting their mail when their lights and stuff get cut off, they'll know why because they did get no bills," said Theresa Hutchinson, talking about the reality for tenants at Linwood Senior Living, which is low-income housing owned by Symphony Management -- they haven't had their mail delivered to their mailboxes in three months.

Theresa, who says she's been here for nine years, says she's one of the lucky ones.

"I go to the post office thank God I have a way to get there I go maybe once or twice a week," Theresa said.

But for other tenants, they're not so fortunate. This mail mess all starts the week before Christmas of last year, the manager of the building says a letter carrier told them their old mailboxes were outdated and needed to be updated to receive mail, so a local company was brought in to install new mailboxes.

But there was a problem -- the new mailboxes needed new locks and new keys which the post office had to order.

In the meantime, mail has been dropped off at Linwood Senior Living for pickup.

"They stopped doing it because they're giving out the wrong mail to people because mine got mixed up some guy brought mine's I'm glad he brought it because I would've never knew about it," Theresa said.

So instead, Linwood tenants for weeks, have had to go three miles away to a post office on Manhattan Avenue, near University Heights, to pickup their mail.

"These people in wheelchairs, walkers, they can't go all the way to Manhattan, they don't have transportation," Theresa said.

More than 70 residents live there.

"It's terrible because like I said there's people here expecting mail everybody expects some kind of mail, you might be waiting on a check who knows your bills, you haven't gotten a bill in four or five months," Theresa said.

As for those locks and keys that tenants have been waiting on, News 4 has received an update from the postal service. According to a spokesperson, the new locks arrived Thursday morning, they were installed Thursday afternoon, and mail delivery service will resume to Linwood residents Friday, resolving this situation.

If you have a Call 4 Action complaint, you can call our hotline at 716-879-4900.