A sign on the door at the Export post office tells the story — one that seems to be disappointing this borough of about 900 people. “On Thursday June 26 we are temporarily moving our retail and box service to the Murrysville post office.” Wednesday will be the last day of operation for the post office on Kennedy Avenue, its location since the early 1960s. Customers were notified of the change via letter about June 12. “I think it’s really sad it’s going to be closing,” said Elizabeth Nagoda, who was at the Export post office with her 2-year-old son, Joe, on Friday. “So we’re going to have to travel into Murrysville and across (Route) 22 just to go to the post office. It’s more of a hassle.” Tad Kelly, a Postal Service spokesman, said the agency was told by landlord Arthur Spagnol that the lease on the building was going to be terminated at the end of the month. “We’re making sure services aren’t interrupted, and people are able to receive mail and purchase stamps,” Kelly said. “We do appreciate customers’ patience. We’re putting our thinking caps on and looking at any option we have.” All employees of the Export post office will be transferred to Murrysville, and home mail delivery will not be affected. Spagnol, owner of Delmar Leasing, said the Postal Service left him with no choice but to end the lease. He has owned the building since 1962 and for more than 40 years collected $428 a month for rent, but paid sewage and water bills and maintenance costs. That lease ended in August 2007. Since then, the two parties have worked under a month-to-month lease of $2,000 a month. “They’re blaming me for canceling the lease,” Spagnol said. “They wanted me to expand, remodel the post office for $60,000. They were going to pay me 6 percent interest for the remodeling and wanted me sign a five-year lease. I could never get the money back. It was either (terminate the lease) or lose more money.” Long-time Export resident Kathy Yanko said more of an effort should have been made to prevent the closure. “They should have worked harder to either work out a deal or find something else or find another building,” Yanko said. “There’s a lot of different places they can utilize. I really don’t know that they tried at all. I don’t know if the post office was interested in trying.” But Export officials are trying to keep a post office in their borough. “It’s still my hope we can get involved in some public meetings with the post office,” said Councilwoman Melanie Litz. “We’re all just afraid if they move (to Murrysville), they’re not coming back.” The issue caused tension at the last meeting of Export Council as Mayor Bob Campagna criticized Council President Barry Delissio and Councilman John Nagoda for not informing him of a meeting with a member of U.S. Representative Jason Altmire’s staff regarding the matter. “Why did they hold the meeting without notifying council• We have to do things as a group,” Campagna said. “We just have to try to come to some kind of solution.” Wayne Norris, owner of Dura-Bond Steel in Export, was appointed to a committee working to keep a post office presence in Export. He said there have been conversations with the Postal Service about opening a temporary facility in the downtown parking lot. “I think they’re very receptive,” Norris said. “It would be easier to come there than fight traffic in Murrysville.” Scott Duff of Scott A. Duff Publications in Export said he will be inconvenienced by the post office’s closure because he normally stops there six days a week. Duff said he will have to travel an additional 1,500 miles a year to pick up mail at the Murrysville office, which is just under five miles away, costing him at least an extra $400 in gas annually. “As a business owner, you try to control your overhead. This isn’t helping,” Duff said. “The big thing that irks me is we’re supposed to be conserving gas, then they go and do this.” The closure has some personal significance to Duff. His father, J. Arthur Duff Jr., worked out of that building for 43 years, and his stepmother, Norma Duff, is a rural carrier for the office. “It makes you kind of like a second-rate town,” Duff said. Norris would agree. “Having a post office in town is recognition for our existence and importance,” Norris said. “A little bit of pride leaves when a post office leaves your town. We’re not going to let that happen. We’re going to fight hard to keep it.”

---

Copyright ©2026— Trib Total Media, LLC (TribLIVE.com)

---