USPS confirms future closures

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The U.S. Postal Service said today it would proceed with its earlier plans to shut down five mail processing centers in Wisconsin.

The Wausau processing and distribution facility will move to Green Bay. Similar facilities in Eau Claire and La Crosse will both move to Saint Paul Minnesota. Kenosha's processing operations will be consolidated in Milwaukee. And Portage mail handling will be done in Madison instead.

Retail operations at the five locations will stay open. Postal officials said the moves were the result of a five-month study.

Congress has ordered a moratorium on post office closures that runs through mid-May, but the Postal Service could not say when the Wisconsin moves would take place. It's not immediately known how many jobs will be cut.

The Postal Service previously said 252 U.S. processing sites could be closed to cut millions of dollars in losses as mail volumes keep dropping.

Postal unions say the planned reductions in next-day deliveries will hurt business, and they said the fiscal problems could be solved if Congress would allocate retirement system overpayments to the agency, and end the requirement of pre-funding postal retirement benefits.

Tags: government, business, wisconsin