WASHINGTON – After U.S. Senator Claire McCaskill discovered in 2017 that some Missourians living near the Iowa border have mailing addresses for Iowa instead of Missouri, she called for the United States Postal Service (USPS) to resolve the issue and introduced a bill to fix it. Now, McCaskill has discovered that the problem extends to Missourians living near the Arkansas border around the Bull Shoals Lake area. In a letter to USPS, McCaskill thanked the agency for fixing the problem for some northern Missourians but raised additional questions over the extent of the issue.
“Seems pretty simple to me—if you live in Missouri, your address should say Missouri,” McCaskill said. “It’s ridiculous that folks are inconvenienced because of this bizarre quirk. I’m glad that USPS has now resolved this problem for some Missourians along the Iowa border, but this shouldn’t look like a game of whack-a-mole. Now that we know this issue extends to Missourians living near the Arkansas border, it’s high time for USPS to fix this once and for all.”
After learning in late 2017 that some Missourians near the Iowa address have Iowa addresses, McCaskill reached out to USPS to try to get the problem fixed. She sat down with the Postmaster General and introduced a bill to require that everyone in the United States has a mailing address in the state they live in. McCaskill’s letter thanks the Postmaster General for ensuring that all Missourians in Clark and Scotland Counties have Missouri addresses, but brought up new concerns after learning from USPS that some Missourians near the Arkansas border are also dealing with this issue.
“As you know, this address issue creates unnecessary burdens for these residents, affecting various aspects of their everyday life,” McCaskill wrote to the Postmaster General. “Small business owners have had to jump through unnecessary hoops. One family had issues with obtaining a death certificate after a loved one passed away, another struggled with obtaining their insurance claim after their house burned down.” McCaskill requested a comprehensive list of home and business addresses that are in Missouri but have a mailing address in a different state and reiterated the importance of USPS fixing this problem.
Read McCaskill’s letter to USPS HERE.
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