Liberty Twp. newsletters delivered

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The printer of the Liberty Township newsletter confirmed Friday they have been delivered, adding he wants to set the record straight, be paid for rendered services, and is seeking an apology from a trustee.

“Don’t throw me under the bus,” said Larry Garrett, owner of Mail Pro 1 LLC.

In a July 30 special meeting of the Liberty Township Board of Trustees, Human Resources Manager Cathy Buehrer told trustees that 6,000 newsletters that were to be mailed out to every resident in the township were unaccounted for from the Powell Post Office.

Garrett said when he had learned of the “delivery concerns,” his team immediately reviewed all documentation and contacted the postal service at the district and regional levels.

“The postal service sent people through to see if there was any mail sitting in the post office,” he said. “All-in-all, they were delivered. The postal service is very good at getting thousands of pieces of mail delivered every day.”

Friday afternoon, Garrett sent an email addressed to Liberty Township.

“For the record, Mail Pro 1 was contracted by Liberty Township to provide a mailing list of only Liberty Township residents, print letters, envelopes, prepare the mailing, and enter into the (USPS). This was done in accordance with all USPS rules and regulations,” Garrett’s email states.

Garrett adds the newsletters were not “dropped off at some mailbox,” but they were delivered to the USPS Business Mail Entry Unit in Columbus, where they were “inspected for correctness and accepted for delivery.”

“For this service, Mail Pro 1 billed Liberty Township $4,822, not $10,000 as has been reported to the newspaper,” Garrett states. “It must be noted that Mail Pro 1 is not responsible for the delivery of the mail pieces, nor do we offer any guarantees other than what the Postal Service offers.”

According to Trustee Shyra Eichhorn, the resolution authorizing $10,000 for the newsletters was to pay the cost of printing and any future mailings from the township.

Garrett is also demanding an apology from Eichhorn for the comments she made in a July special meeting when trustees authorized the payment of purchase orders and blanket certificates, except for the one for $10,000 to Mail Pro 1. The decision not to pay Mail Pro 1 was due to the newsletters being reported as missing.

As previously reported, in a special meeting on July 30, Gemperline moved to authorized the $10,000 payment to Mail Pro 1, but Eichhorn refused to second his motion.

“I won’t second anything that has Mail Pro for $10,000,” Eichhorn stated. “I’ll second the motion if we take Mail Pro off, but I’m not going to second a waste of money.”

Garrett points out that Mail Pro 1 is an approved full-service mail provider of the USPS with over 50-years of experience in printing and mailing services, and he confirms in the email that the newsletters had been delivered to the residents of Liberty Township.

“I have resolve of this issue and will be more than happy to share with Liberty Township administration after we receive your payment for $4,822 and a written apology from Trustee Eichhorn … ,” Garrett states in the email.

In response to Garrett’s email, Eichhorn readdressed the statement she made during the July public meeting.

“Now that it has been confirmed that the post office has delivered all the mailers, Mail Pro 1 needs to be paid,” she said. “My comments weren’t specifically about the vendor. There was nothing fiscally conservative or necessary about this expenditure.”

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By D. Anthony Botkin

[email protected]

Contact D. Anthony Botkin at 740-413-0902. Follow him on Twitter @dabotkin.

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