Residents Want ZIP Code Woes to Be Addressed : Mail: City will petition the U.S. Postal Service for a single ZIP code within its irregular boundaries. The present system has caused confusion for years.

By BERNICE HIRABAYASHI

Aug. 11, 1991 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

The only thing that stood between Colleen Cronin and an education at Stanford University was a confusing postal address.

The prestigious school had accepted Cronin, then a senior at Culver City High School. But the address on her acceptance letter contained a critical mistake--it said Culver City, which was Cronin’s city of residence, instead of Los Angeles, which designates the post office that delivers her mail.

“The post office didn’t acknowledge that as a valid address,” Cronin said, recalling the letter that arrived two weeks late bearing the marks of woefully misdirected mail. “So it got returned. . . . We were really anxious.”

Cronin, who ended up earning a bachelor’s degree in music and a master’s in education from Stanford, was one of more than 100 disgruntled Culver City residents who wrote to the city with complaints about their mail service.

The city petitioned residents for the letters, and will present them later this month to the U.S. Postal Service along with a seemingly simple request--that residents of Culver City be allowed to use Culver City as part of their address.

The city of about 39,000 has a serious postal identity crisis. It is served by nine ZIP codes, five of which require city designations of Los Angeles, Venice or Marina del Rey. Residents say this results in missed mail, confusion over where to turn for city and emergency services, higher insurance rates and lack of community identity.

“This battle has been going on for 10 or 11 years,” said Culver City Councilwoman Jozelle Smith. Smith took the city’s request to the postmaster general in Washington three years ago, but was flatly told that the ZIP code situation could not be changed.

“I wasn’t satisfied with that answer,” she said, adding that new postal policies have opened the door for another attempt.

Culver City Postmaster Dave Quella said that when Culver City’s ZIP code boundaries were drawn in the early 1960s, the intent was to streamline mail delivery, and conforming with city boundaries was thought to be less important.

“It’s a rather strange layout of a city,” he noted.

Two Culver City post offices deliver most of the city’s mail, using 90232 and 90230 ZIP codes. Post office boxes in the city account for two more, 90231 and 90233.

But about 3,800 residences and businesses must use an address that bears the name of another city. The majority are located in the Los Angeles 90066 ZIP code, which covers most of the narrow western arm of Culver City that extends for two miles into Los Angeles, reaching almost to Lincoln Boulevard. The westernmost tip of that arm is served by two more ZIP codes, Venice 90291 and Marina del Rey 90292.

Two other Los Angeles ZIP codes service small border sections of the city. A cemetery on the south uses 90045 (Westchester), and small lots of undeveloped land near Venice Boulevard use 90034 (Palms).

If the words Culver City appear on an envelope with a Los Angeles, Venice or Marina del Rey ZIP code, automated mail sorters spit it out because the match is not recognized by postal machinery, Quella said. Unless the letter is snatched up by a watchful worker, it will be sent to another post office, be returned to sender, or both.

To complicate matters further, the two principal Culver City ZIP codes, 90230 and 90232, also serve portions of Los Angeles. A large portion of the Del Rey area of Los Angeles, south of Culver Boulevard and east of Centinela Avenue, has a Culver City 90230 mailing address. A smaller slice of Los Angeles along Venice Boulevard uses 90232. West Los Angeles College, located in unincorporated county territory, also has a Culver City 90230 address.

Most complaints received by Culver City in response to its public appeal came from residents in the 90066 area, and they made clear that the problems related to geographical confusion were not limited to misdirected mail.

Gadelle Junge wrote that when her car was broken into, her request to have a report taken was bounced back and forth between Culver City and Los Angeles police departments. After several phone calls, a Los Angeles police officer came to her home and began taking the report, only to stop halfway when he realized he was in Culver City.

“I have lived here for over 27 years,” she wrote, “and have always thought it was stupid the way things were set up.”

The confusion also creates trouble for firefighters and paramedics. Although the 911 emergency telephone system is highly accurate in routing calls to the right department, residents who make routine calls to the Culver City Fire Department’s regular phone number sometimes have problems, said Kevin Smith, an analyst with the department.

“They call . . . and they don’t know what city they live in,” Smith said. “If all the mail you receive says Los Angeles, you might very well believe you live in Los Angeles.”

Many letter writers complained that they paid hundreds of dollars in late fees for bills they never received. Margaret Yancu said she finally resorted to keeping a list of creditors and contacting them if an expected bill did not arrive on time.

Some said they were billed by both Los Angeles and Culver City for dog licenses. Many claimed that they paid higher insurance rates based on Los Angeles fire and accident statistics. Some claimed that other Culver City residents discriminated against them because of their Los Angeles address when they signed up for clubs and Recreation Department programs.

One of the biggest complaints was a sense of detachment from the city. The community newspaper did not reach their doorsteps. Voting material arrived late, if at all.

The city itself is inconvenienced. The municipal government cannot do a bulk mailing to all its residents, said Joan Dean, a city project coordinator. The city must maintain a list of non-Culver City addresses, by consulting tax rolls and business licenses, so that the mail can be hand labeled.

“Culver City is one of the worst-case scenarios,” Dean said.

Over the years, communities across the nation have pressured their congressmen to introduce bills that would require the Postal Service to conform ZIP codes to city boundaries.

“The possibility of wholesale loss of control prompted the postmaster general to come up with a formal process for communities to apply for ZIP code boundary changes,” said David Shapiro, director of operations for the Long Beach division of the U.S. Postal Service, whose area includes Culver City.

The process would require the post office to study and document how much requested changes would cost before giving an answer, Shapiro said. If the answer is no, the community can appeal the decision.

One community, Hollypark in the east end of Hawthorne, was granted a ZIP code change last year, Shapiro said. The Long Beach division, which encompasses about one-fourth of Los Angeles County, has six more communities lined up for consideration under the new process, including Culver City.

Asking the postal service to recognize “Culver City 90066” as a legitimate address may seem like a simple request. But in fact, Quella said, “It’s not an easy problem to fix.”

For automatic sorters to recognize Culver City and 90066 as a match, post office databases across the nation will have to be updated, as mail is also scanned at the point of origin, Quella said. Mail would probably have to be trucked between Los Angeles and Culver City post offices during the changeover. Postal routes may have to be reconfigured and staff retrained.

The city will also ask that Los Angeles areas served via Culver City ZIP codes carry their own city names. The city will probably not ask for a new ZIP code, Dean said.

All the Confusion Some cities of 39,000 have a single zip code for all their mail. Not Culver City. It has nine, all but two of which also serve part of Los Angeles.

Venice 90291

Western tip of Culver City, including site of proposed Marina Place shopping center.

Marina del Rey 90292

Several western Culver City parcels on south side of Washington Boulevard.

Los Angeles 90066

Mar Vista ZIP code also serves most Culver City addresses west of the San Diego Freeway.

Los Angeles 90045

Westchester ZIP code serves some addresses near the southern tip of Culver City.

Los Angeles 90034

Palms ZIP code includes a few Culver City parcels along Venice Boulevard.

Culver City 90230

Also serves Del Rey section of Los Angeles.