Posted on: Monday, July 1, 2002

Mailers rush post offices for 3-centers

By Walter Wright
Advertiser Staff Writer

Procrastinating postal patrons scrambled to buy 3-cent stamps here in time for the U.S. Postal Service's increase yesterday in first-class postage to 37 cents.

Those who called at the Makiki Post Office on Pensacola Street yesterday were doubly disappointed.

"I just need one 3-cent stamp, or three ones, to send my letter," said housewife Nellie Arakaki of Makiki, who came to the office with her daughter, Melinda.

But the two postage stamp machines in the office lobby were out of order.

The Rev. Marc Alexander, a priest at Sacred Heart Parish, rushed into the post office, checked the pick-up time and mailed off some official papers for a wedding he had performed Saturday.

"You're not going to make me confess I didn't have a 37-cent stamp, are you?" Alexander asked.

"Well, yes, I know, confession is good for the soul," he said. He admitted that he'd "wasted money" and used two 33-cent stamps.

"But I had to send those wedding papers in," he said. "The couple would not have been very happy if I'd waited."

Bill Tupua, a laboratory assistant at Kaiser Medical Center, was upset about the near 10-percent hike in the cost of a first-class stamp.

"That's a lot higher than the inflation rate," he said. "That's a lot of money. If you have five bills to pay, that's an extra 15 cents a month, and over the years, that adds up."

Reach Walter Wright at wwright@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8054.