Taking charge of a community service: Postmaster James Toolan for ZIP code 11965

A basketball sits in a corner behind James Toolan’s desk in his office at the Height’s Post Office. Asked about it, he quickly grabbed it, gave it a spin and balanced the spinning ball on the tip of a pen. He never looked at the rapidly revolving ball — a neat trick —explaining with a smile, “I’m  in a lot of Zoom meetings these days, and holding this is, I guess is what you’d call my comfort ball.”

The postmaster of ZIP code 11965 played high school hoops growing up in Northport, and he went on to play as a 6-foot-4 point guard at East Stroudsburg, University of Pennsylvania, a NCAA Division II School.

Mr. Toolan doesn’t play much anymore, he said. Golf is his game these days. But the ball is always nearby.

Other things he takes comfort in is his family in Aquebogue, wife Kathy and two daughters, Madison and Carly. His career in the United States Postal Service (USPS), began in 1991.

The job has sometimes been stressful — especially during the early days of the pandemic — but he finds it fulfilling, especially on Shelter Island. “We never forget that our mission is to provide a consistent service to the community,” Mr. Toolan said. “That’s what we’re here for, and to get better at that mission all the time.”

On Shelter Island, he noted that the post offices, as in many other small towns, are also “community centers. It’s where you come to get mail and use our services, but it’s where you meet people face-to-face.”

During times of oncoming severe weather events and in their aftermaths, or in a national crisis, such as 9/11, he said, the post office is where people come to not just get information, but to be with neighbors and share news, along with a sense of community solidarity.

Heights postmaster since August, Mr. Toolan knows the Island, from days when his sister lived in East Marion. “We’d cross the Island to go surfing in Montauk, and on the way back stop here for something to eat at the Chequit and other places.”

When Madison was a little girl, they’d come during and after snowy days to go sledding on Goat Hill. And one of the pleasures of summer is a night out here for him and Kathy for a meal at The Flying Goat.

He and Kathy are looking forward to the return of the July fireworks show off Crescent Beach, something they’ve enjoyed over the years, and any upcoming concerts at Wades Beach, which they’ve also enjoyed in the past.

He knew he had big shoes to fill, taking over permanently for Cheryl Brown, who retired in the autumn of 2020 after 21 years as the Heights postmaster. Originally established by the federal government in 1880 and called the Prospect Grove P.O., no person has served longer in the top job there than Ms. Brown, a testament to her work ethic, ability to serve the public promptly and efficiently, and the confidence of her superiors on the district level of the USPS.

Mr. Toolan has had many roles in the USPS. He’s been an instructor at the Long Island Sales and Services Associate Training program, worked as a business specialist in the USPS Marketing Department and was one of two field account representatives on Long Island.

Any business has to field complaints, he  said, and the Post Office, which has a daily traffic of customers, has its share. “I handle all of that,” Mr. Toolan said. “My clerks know to keep their cool, and let me know right away if someone is upset. I tell the customer, ‘You have a legitimate gripe. Let’s talk and figure this out.’”

Times have changed and everyone in the USPS has to understand the shifts that the pandemic and ubiquitous technology has made, he said, adding, “We’ve got to look at the operational issues that the population increases all over the East End have made for us.”

The pandemic has seen people with second homes making Shelter Island their permanent residences, as well as newcomers buying property to move out of urban centers, all contributing to more work for the post office.

He noted that e-commerce and doing banking and other business on the internet has cut mail service in many ways, although the pandemic has seen a skyrocketing number of parcels or packages that the USPS has to manage.

“Pre-pandemic, we’d have 30 to 50 parcels a week,” Mr. Toolan said. “With the pandemic, we’re handling 150 to 220. Not everyone was set up for that. But we’ve pretty much got it squared away.”

Next week, the Reporter visits Mary Payne of the Center Post Office.