Bulk Mail on Table petition?

sounds like a terrible land lord. those new boxes are cheap. and they fit magazines and other things!!

get the bastard t o fix them asap. if he is that stubborn ask the post office if you can get mail at the post office or forward it to a pobox.

I'd write a letter demanding proper mailboxes and circulate it in your building - you don't want random people having access to your mail whether it's financial statements or magazine subscriptions.
And/or lobby the other tenants not to sign landlord's petition (slip a note under all the doors, or post a sign next to the petition if it's posted in the hall)
That is just such b.s.: a petition to neglect basic services?

I have a friend whose mail I pick up when she's out of town. They have small but functioning mailboxes, and an overflow bin for large items. No obvious security issue since it's a small building where people know each other but it's a pain in the ass to pick through eight other apts mail. Theoretically, the USPS has done that for you already.

Good luck!

I think the bulk shelf/table solution only works in small buildings. I second pitu's suggestion of circulating a letter/petition demanding larger mailboxes. also, check out tenant.net (I think that's the place) to see if there is some regulation re: landlords violating federal law.

Communal mail for forty units is insane. The USPS has the final ruling on the mailbox, and the fact that they won't deliver to them anymore means that your landlord has to put in ones that they will deliver to. Period. Here is a document that might help you:
https://a996-housingauthority.nyc.gov/Landlord/view_doc.aspx?id=64

i'm pretty sure the LL was ordered to replace the mailbox. (this was a court that could only order repairs, not deal with damages.) but the english was pretty broken and the non-english was nothing i could understand any of at all -- an african language, i think -- so i don't want to imply that i'm certain of any of this.

Wow. What a lazy, cheap landlord! He'd rather petition to dump all the mail in a pile than do something about his rotten mailboxes?

We are in the same situation, in a smaller building (16 units). We have the small old fashioned boxes that fit nothing, although the mail carrier will STILL stuff the Netflix discs in there on occasion.

Then we have a giant, messy pile of mail (that no one ever sorts through) on a little stool which is an incredibly inconvenient 6 inches off the ground! So we have to bend down to the ground to dig through the (mostly junk, but not always) mail. Not easy coming home from work with your hands full.

I really wish our landlord would do something about this. I know for a fact that there are things I have not received because of this arrangement and the pile of mail is always overflowing and scatters all over the lobby. I have important things sent to me at work.

In most regards, my landlord is GREAT. He fixes things immediately and keeps the place clean. I have no idea why he is still in the mailbox dark ages, especially from what I understand, any capital improvement he makes will allow him to jack up the prices.

daver wrote: Here is a document that might help you:
https://a996-housingauthority.nyc.gov/Landlord/view_doc.aspx?id=64

Actually the document above will only help if you are in NYCHA (and probably not even then. If you live in NYCHA housing, good luck making any changes.) which is the NYC Housing Authority, ie: low, moderate income, Section 8 housing etc. NYCHA regulations are separate from regular rent guidelines.

This is probably what non-NYCHA ppl should refer to:
http://www.housingnyc.com/html/resources/attygenguide.html#14

Scroll down to INDIVIDUAL LOCKS, PEEPHOLES AND MAIL

jayce wrote: i have a bad feeling this is going to be a very long battle.
i really expected a lot more from this landlord.

Is there any chance that the landlord just . . . isn't in the 21st century yet and actually thinks this is not a big deal and that s/he is being communicative by sending a petition out to the tenants? Sounds crazy, but I just wondered if
a. they were older (or something)
b. you reached out for a direct conversation

I know you said the landlord is refusing to fix the boxes, but I wonder if that was in response to direct requests or defacto because of their suggestion that it all be in a heap somewhere.

jayce wrote: He funnels everything through a management company. The management company says he does not want to fix the boxes. And he is one of the more savvy people on housing issues you will meet. He is deliberately walking a fine line of not wanting to invest in the building but stay on the overall legal side of that fine line. in this case, i believe he has crossed it. he disagrees.

but yeah, i have tried everything. i think the only way this will work is if enough people opt not to sign the petition and push for what is legally right.

what a drag!
even if many sign the petition, you can't sign away your rights . . .
not that I have any idea how that works in terms of housing regs, but you know what I mean.
again, GOOD LUCK!

The NYC HOUSING CODE is very specific. The LL must provide working mailboxes. If the old ones are small, you may not be able to force an upgrade to larger ones, but the existing ones must be kept usable per postal regs

A call to 311 can get the housing inspector there to write the violation, but I always recommend a direct written request to the LL first. Many LL (including myself) sometimes need the extra push of the "written" request.

You may also try to get the local postmaster to send a letter to the LL telling him he is out of compliance.

Mail is "sacred" and should not be fooled around with. Nobody, including tenants, wants problems with his/her mail.

Remember that when a first class item or parcel doesn't fit in the mail box, the postal service leaves a note that you can pick it up at the post office. Not convenient maybe, but secure.

Years ago before the EBT card, welfare folks used to get their checks in the mail.

Anytime there was trouble with mail boxes and those people complained about it, you would see it on the 6 o'clock news. God forbid their welfare checks were delayed.

But those days are over because it's all electronic now.

There is nothing wrong with being the only one complaining, when you are in the right.

Did someone famous say that before??