As of May 16, Alna's Paul Crandall said he still wasn't getting mail at home.

But mail delivery in Alna, largely gone recently, is tracking better, at least for some. "Truly a miracle — the mail is being delivered!" fellow resident Mary Bowers said the same afternoon.

Deliveries in the Lincoln County town had dropped to just parcels, with residents and town officials having to go to the Newcastle post office to pick up the rest; then, some postal customers started to receive mail again, at least sometimes; and by May 14 and 15, town officials were reporting more reason to hope.

Since Alna's surprise loss of delivery due to a job vacancy for a carrier, Third Selectman Coreysha Stone has sought to get service back in town and been encouraging others to also make calls, including to state and federal lawmakers. Stone told Wiscasset Newspaper May 14, she'd gotten a call from a consumer affairs manager at the postal service's district office in Portland, telling her "that within a week they should have someone designated for the Alna route and mail should be delivered four to five days per week for a period of time. The hope is to get us 100% back to regular mail delivery eventually. He did seem very confident that within the week we would at least be up to a four to five day delivery schedule for all mail (including letter mail)," she said via email. 

What difference, if any, did she think people's phone calls, etc. had all made? Hard to say, Stone said, "because I can’t compare it to another time where we didn’t make all these efforts ... I would say that all the communication didn’t hurt and I think that the more people who heard about the issue and were talking about the issue, especially those with any influence on a federal level, certainly got the ball rolling.

"And if anything, hopefully this will prevent future issues." She noted the postal district official "expressed that there is a planning issue with the fleet turnover rates, and they’re trying to get new fleets ready to take over old fleets and improve on the timing of that transition on a systemic level."

Stone added, "I think really the most important thing is that the community knows there are leaders who care about issues that impact us on a daily basis and are willing to make efforts to advocate on their behalf. It is important for community morale as a whole to know that government, although not perfect, can spring into action to help when there is a breakdown in systems even on very small municipal levels and for tiny communities of less than 1,000 residents. It’s easy for people to feel like we don’t matter because of our reading population, but it’s comforting to know that our concerns are heard and actions can be taken to address those concerns; this is how government should function."

An update U.S. Sen. Susan Collins' press secretary, Blake Kernen, gave Wiscasset Newspaper May 16 also noted the anticipated four to five days a week delivery. "Sen. Collins’ office reached out to USPS and they responded to let us know they are actively recruiting people for multiple positions and said residents should be receiving their mail four to five times a week. 

 "We will keep you all up to date on this as we continue to work to ensure Mainers in every corner of the state receive timely service," Kernen added.