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Another small town lost in the mail
Owner fears language laws will drive post office from Fitzroy Harbour's only retail store
BY KELLY EGAN, THE OTTAWA CITIZENSEPTEMBER 17, 2010
The postman, it turns out, does ring twice.
Canada Post is delivering more unrest to rural Eastern Ontario -- signed and sealed with a French twist -- the déjà vu of Pakenham.
It is not yet 9 a.m., but 23 people are packed into a little room at the rear of the Harbour Store. Coffee is poured. A little redheaded child plays under the table with a messy muffin.
Otherwise, it's all business.
Frustration is bubbling over Canada Post's handling of the village postal outlet, a cornerstone of daily life for more than a century.
"Right now, I need help. I need the public's help," store owner Kai Zhang told the assembled.
"Some nights, I can't sleep. I don't know what's wrong with me," she stammered, near tears.
"Nothing, Kai," came a pair of replies. "There's nothing wrong with you."
The postal outlet is in the front corner of the store -- the only store, by the way, in the Harbour, home to fewer than 1,000 year-round residents.
Zhang, mother of two, caregiver to her elderly parents, came to Canada from China seven years ago and bought the store last October.
She did so with the understanding that she would become postmistress, as has been the tradition in the store for decades.
It is, after all, home to 210 silver post boxes and a tiny sorting station while providing stamps and other services. It was a key part of her business plan -- a built-in salary, a small amount of rent from Canada Post, an income stream to supplement the retail outlet.
Zhang outlined her story to the crowd of villagers.
When she took over, she began running the postal outlet as she was trained by the seller. She mailed in her time cards, as instructed. Nothing happened. No pay. And, for 11 months, no rent from Canada Post.
In the ensuing months, it became clear she would have to apply for the job, that it was not grandfathered to the store. By July, she had applied, only to find out there was a bilingual clause requiring her to have "functional" French.
Because she lives and owns a second store in Gatineau, she knows she can communicate in basic French, but is unsure whether she can make the B grade. (She took a language proficiency test over the phone this week.)
Rules are rules, of course. Just as rules are fools. There are virtually no French-only speakers in this corner of rural Ottawa.
"I had already bought the store. Now you tell me I need fluency in French?" she said after the meeting.
Canada Post spokesman John Caines offers a different version.
He says Zhang was told "all along" that she would need to apply for the position, which he says has always had a bilingual requirement.
There are no secrets in a place like Fitzroy Harbour, and it became clear at the meeting that a Canada Post official had been discreetly inquiring whether there was another suitable location in the village for the post office.
"Deplorable" was the word used to describe the current postal outlet, a word that rankled.
"I'll tell you what's deplorable," said Brian D'Arcy, 72, a longtime resident.
"It's 2701 Riverside Dr., Canada Post headquarters. It's like a mausoleum, a tomb. You walk in there and you feel like an alien."
The Harbour is a rural store, he pointed out. "I don't think it's deplorable. What the hell are they talking about?"
One small business owner said his mail had been regularly messed up since the store lost its own postmaster, endangering his credit rating.
"I mean, who knows rural towns?" asked West Carleton-March Coun. Eli El-Chantiry, an observer at the meeting. "Those people who work in that, sorry for the expression, Taj Mahal?"
As a longtime shopkeeper, he underlined the importance of having a regular draw -- like a post office -- to create steady traffic through the door.
Another woman said the sequence of events made her feel "ashamed" to be Canadian.
As in the row over the Pakenham postmistress, Canada Post is holding to the position that a federal statute demands bilingual service in the National Capital Region, an expansive area that takes in a big chunk of Eastern Ontario.
Zhang, meanwhile, said she was surprised to get a call in late August from a Canada Post official offering her $150 a month in rent, retroactive to last November.
"I just don't know what's next?"
The meeting ended with a consensus to hold a bigger public meeting soon, lobby Canada Post and bring into the loop the office of their MP, Gordon O'Connor.
It is, frankly, a sad installment in the constant fraying of rural Ontario. In 2005, they shut the only public school in Fitzroy, which had operated in one guise or other since 1830.
Now they want to monkey with the only post office, inside the only store?
Sure. And pretty soon Fitzroy Harbour is "address unknown."
Contact Kelly Egan at 613-726-5896 or by e-mail, kegan@thecitizen.canwest.com
© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/Another+small+town+lost+mail/3536959/story.html
Owner fears language laws will drive post office from Fitzroy Harbour's only retail store
BY KELLY EGAN, THE OTTAWA CITIZENSEPTEMBER 17, 2010
The postman, it turns out, does ring twice.
Canada Post is delivering more unrest to rural Eastern Ontario -- signed and sealed with a French twist -- the déjà vu of Pakenham.
It is not yet 9 a.m., but 23 people are packed into a little room at the rear of the Harbour Store. Coffee is poured. A little redheaded child plays under the table with a messy muffin.
Otherwise, it's all business.
Frustration is bubbling over Canada Post's handling of the village postal outlet, a cornerstone of daily life for more than a century.
"Right now, I need help. I need the public's help," store owner Kai Zhang told the assembled.
"Some nights, I can't sleep. I don't know what's wrong with me," she stammered, near tears.
"Nothing, Kai," came a pair of replies. "There's nothing wrong with you."
The postal outlet is in the front corner of the store -- the only store, by the way, in the Harbour, home to fewer than 1,000 year-round residents.
Zhang, mother of two, caregiver to her elderly parents, came to Canada from China seven years ago and bought the store last October.
She did so with the understanding that she would become postmistress, as has been the tradition in the store for decades.
It is, after all, home to 210 silver post boxes and a tiny sorting station while providing stamps and other services. It was a key part of her business plan -- a built-in salary, a small amount of rent from Canada Post, an income stream to supplement the retail outlet.
Zhang outlined her story to the crowd of villagers.
When she took over, she began running the postal outlet as she was trained by the seller. She mailed in her time cards, as instructed. Nothing happened. No pay. And, for 11 months, no rent from Canada Post.
In the ensuing months, it became clear she would have to apply for the job, that it was not grandfathered to the store. By July, she had applied, only to find out there was a bilingual clause requiring her to have "functional" French.
Because she lives and owns a second store in Gatineau, she knows she can communicate in basic French, but is unsure whether she can make the B grade. (She took a language proficiency test over the phone this week.)
Rules are rules, of course. Just as rules are fools. There are virtually no French-only speakers in this corner of rural Ottawa.
"I had already bought the store. Now you tell me I need fluency in French?" she said after the meeting.
Canada Post spokesman John Caines offers a different version.
He says Zhang was told "all along" that she would need to apply for the position, which he says has always had a bilingual requirement.
There are no secrets in a place like Fitzroy Harbour, and it became clear at the meeting that a Canada Post official had been discreetly inquiring whether there was another suitable location in the village for the post office.
"Deplorable" was the word used to describe the current postal outlet, a word that rankled.
"I'll tell you what's deplorable," said Brian D'Arcy, 72, a longtime resident.
"It's 2701 Riverside Dr., Canada Post headquarters. It's like a mausoleum, a tomb. You walk in there and you feel like an alien."
The Harbour is a rural store, he pointed out. "I don't think it's deplorable. What the hell are they talking about?"
One small business owner said his mail had been regularly messed up since the store lost its own postmaster, endangering his credit rating.
"I mean, who knows rural towns?" asked West Carleton-March Coun. Eli El-Chantiry, an observer at the meeting. "Those people who work in that, sorry for the expression, Taj Mahal?"
As a longtime shopkeeper, he underlined the importance of having a regular draw -- like a post office -- to create steady traffic through the door.
Another woman said the sequence of events made her feel "ashamed" to be Canadian.
As in the row over the Pakenham postmistress, Canada Post is holding to the position that a federal statute demands bilingual service in the National Capital Region, an expansive area that takes in a big chunk of Eastern Ontario.
Zhang, meanwhile, said she was surprised to get a call in late August from a Canada Post official offering her $150 a month in rent, retroactive to last November.
"I just don't know what's next?"
The meeting ended with a consensus to hold a bigger public meeting soon, lobby Canada Post and bring into the loop the office of their MP, Gordon O'Connor.
It is, frankly, a sad installment in the constant fraying of rural Ontario. In 2005, they shut the only public school in Fitzroy, which had operated in one guise or other since 1830.
Now they want to monkey with the only post office, inside the only store?
Sure. And pretty soon Fitzroy Harbour is "address unknown."
Contact Kelly Egan at 613-726-5896 or by e-mail, kegan@thecitizen.canwest.com
© Copyright (c) The Ottawa Citizen
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/Another+small+town+lost+mail/3536959/story.html
