Mount Vernon postmaster Kim Konkowski is retiring, with her last day Aug. 30.
“The job has been a challenge at times, but it’s allowed me to support my family, and the company has allowed me to expand and do many different things over the course of my 26-year career,” Konkowski said.
Konkowski started working with the USPS more than 26 years ago as a non-career holiday worker in the plant in Omaha, Neb. She continued as a part time flex carrier for a number of years.
“At that time, I had four young kids and I had to make a choice on staying as a carrier with less flexible hours or going the management track and gaining more flexible hours,” Konkowski said.
She started as a 204b sub management employee and became a supervisor in Omaha. In 2004, she and her family moved closer to her hometown of Mount Vernon.
“My parents were getting older and I wanted to be closer to them at that time,” Konkowski said.
Konkowski was a supervisor at post offices throughout Cedar Rapids, working at the northeast, southwest and annex locations. She also had a stint as the officer in charge of some smaller post offices in towns like Farley. When the position of postmaster opened in Mount Vernon, Konkowski took it.
Konkowski said that the crew at Mount Vernon have been some of the best she has worked with and have made her job so much easier.
“I’ve worked at post offices of every shape – from the very large to the very small,” Konkowski said. “Building the team we have in Mount Vernon has been terrific. I would not have been as successful as a postmaster in Mount Vernon without the team we have here.”
Konkowski said that was especially true during the pandemic and derecho in 2020, when the entire crew worked to make sure mail delivery continued throughout.
“There are so many things we accomplish at the post office,” Konkowski said. “I’ve always been one of the quiet ones working behind the scenes and prided myself on doing the most I can to help customers.”
One of the most satisfying cases Konkowski remembers is when a customer sent a very valuable item via registered mail and the package got lost between Mount Vernon and its destination.
Konkowski said she worked to track the package from Mount Vernon and to its destination and had to communicate with several different post offices along that trek. While the work was very time consuming, the item was eventually found and safely delivered.
What she isn’t going to miss now that she’s stepping down is the lack of sleep the job has caused.
She recalls years ago hiring someone for a position similar to her position, and what he really wanted to do was carry mail.
“I didn’t understand it at the time, but I do now,” Konkowski said. “I’m ready to just be responsible for me. I’ve been a parent for the past 35 years and worked for the USPS for the past 26, which coincided with my parenting. I’m ready to put myself first and do things on my time.”
Konkowski said she does not have any immediate plans in her retirement aside from visiting her sister in Arizona.
Over the next two years, after a few months of relaxing, her plan is to get back in shape and then take part in one of her bucket list goals – hiking the Grand Canyon Rim to Rim.
Her children and their families – Jared, Jessica, Jennifer and Janay-are all across Iowa now and she looks forward to attending more of her grandchildren’s events and visiting her kids as well.
Konkowski said there are a lot of things people need to keep in mind when it comes to mail delivery.
“Dogs have teeth and they do bite,” Konkowski said. “Don’t be offended if we don’t deliver your mail because your dog or animal was out.”
Painted porches get slippery in the rain and winter and trudging through knee deep snow in the middle of winter is a challenge for many postal carriers.
“Our postal carriers walk the equivalent of 12 to 14 miles a day in all sorts of weather conditions,” Konkowski said.
It is also carriers’ jobs only to deliver mail. Carriers do collect mail to be delivered, but if they don’t have a piece of mail for a certain home and they can’t see a flag up or notification there is something to pick-up, they might miss that house that day.
Konkowski will be spending two weeks helping with a rural route count in Iowa City, and then using some of her unused vacation time up to her official retirement date of Oct. 31.
“Kelly Wells will be the officer in charge of Mount Vernon for the time being,” Konkowski said. “She knows everyone on the post office side as well as many of our customers and the community and has worked for the post office for more than 30 years herself, so she knows the procedures and things that need to be done.”