Stolen Mail

Tampering with U.S. mailboxes is a federal crime. Forget your HOA. What do you expect them to do? Contact the Postal Inspection Service. They are the enforcement branch for the U.S. Postal Service.

A legal responsibility, No.
An ethical/moral responsibility, perhaps as this would be the same ethical responsibility anyone who has knowledge of the issue to notify others.

Associations should do what is ethical but must do what is legal. As we have all learned, what is legal is not always ethical.


Well, as I pointed out, they have the same moral/ethical responsibility as others who know of the issue. Since you have been made aware of the issue, have you posted signs around the mail area? Have placed fliers on residents doors? Have you gone door to door to inform your neighbors?

If you have done these things, great! The residents are informed.
If you have not done these things, why not? Since you have the same knowledge don't you have the same responsibility as your Association?


No, it's really not too much to ask.

I'm glad you at least made sure the problem was reported. What have you done to report the issue to your neighbors?


You can certainly get the addresses by requesting a copy (your right as a member) or by walking around the neighborhood and look at the house addresses.

You could also inform the people without the need for addresses by placing a sign in the mailbox area or by placing flyers on each door. Or take an afternoon and walk around the neighborhood knocking on doors.


How did you learn of the issue?

Was it from the Association or from a neighbor who discovered the issue and took the time to inform others?

If only there were some other big, huge, semi-governmental agency that also had the names and addresses of everyone who was impacted by the crime here...

Oh wait, there is. The post office could easily do their job and notify everyone with a few cards, a poster, etc.. instead, they want to pan the work off on someone else.

We had a rash of mailbox robberies in our HOA years back. My last paycheck from a company got stolen and a few other had their child payments stolen as well. The local police could NOT do anything except take a report and note any vandalism to the boxes. We all had our own keys to our boxes but some boxes were not maintained. It wasn't too hard to break in without causing physical damage.

I had to call the Postal Service and get the Postal Inspectors involved. This is a FEDERAL crime and they must handle the issue. It is also illegal to put anything in a mailbox that does NOT have a stamp on it. If the HOA were to send out notices it could NOT be in a mailbox unless they were mailed out. Which costs money to do. A mass mailing like that could cost the HOA easily $100 in stamps, supplies, and time to create notices. All of which comes out of the HOA's budget.

Is it the responsibility of the HOA to notify owners? No. It's a COURTESY. If you have a neighborhood watch setup they could do it. However, the HOA doesn't really own the mailboxes or the contents inside. The mailboxes just sit on common area to be used a common resource.

It is one of those things that you think in your mind should happen but in reality it's not going to unless someone makes an effort. Don't assume anyone wants to make that effort. If you want an effort made to warn people and you are a member of the HOA, then by all means say something. That is your right to do. However, to put it on the whole of the HOA it is NOT their responsibility. Just a courtesy...

The board would have to address the matter if it was brought up in a meeting by a member or a member could request that the matter be put on the agenda.

As someone who has had my identity stolen twice, I would definitely like to be informed.

That's enough reason to read the newsletter and the meeting minutes.

Richard,

In your OP you said your mailboxes were cluster mailboxes. Later you said that the post office needed to make repairs, which suggests to me that some mail boxes were damaged and mail was stolen by someone breaking into the mailboxes.

It seems to me:

1. If the boxes were damaged, the post office should suspend delivery to that mailbox until it can be repaired or replaced.

2. If my mailbox was damaged, I would know it. I wouldn't have to have someone else tell me and I would make other arrangements for the delivery of my mail.

3. With a cluster mailbox I can see if there are other mailboxes in the cluster that appear to be damaged. Again, I wouldn't need anyone to tell me that delivery to my box in that area could be subject to possible theft and I would make other arrangements for delivery of my mail.

Also, if the mail thefts are the work of some transient laborer, changing the gate code is not going to keep them out. If someone who knows the gate code is giving the code to an unauthorized individual, changing the code won't do any good either. The best kept secret is known by only one person. The more people who know a secret (like a gate code), the less secret it becomes.

We had the identical situation in our community.

Some of the members wanted to hold the Board responsible for not providing security for their mail. We used the advice from the mailman and also the Postal Inspector in that individuals needed to retrieve their mail everyday or if out of town, put a hold on it. We put the information on statements, newsletters and email blasts, even went door-to-door.

We have 24 clusters of mailboxes servicing 317 homes. The problem with the master key was that it was also the same key that the USPS used to open the gates to enter the complex. After about 4 months all the locks were replaced by USPS and we have not had any break-ins since.

Richard,

It sounds like you have one gate code for everyone. Bad idea. Gate control software is fairly easy to come by. Every resident should have his very own gate code as should all contractors and delivery people. This would allow you to keep track of who is entering and when. You would also be able to exclude non-residents from entering at certain times of the night.

Are there any homes near the mailboxes? With the homeowner's permission, mount security cameras on the homes to see who is getting into the boxes.

Find a spy store and see what kind of gizmos they may have. Maybe a device that sets off an alarm when it is disturbed; leave it in your own mailbox and let the thief steal it. Or one of those exploding dye canisters the banks toss in with the stolen money. Maybe a GPS transmitter that will allow you (or the police) to follow it.

"Real Estate experts assert that living in a gated community adds to the homeowner' property values." Funny.

We have no street lamps and, consequently, no electrical source anywhere near our mailboxes. Our lighting is provided by coach lamps that are mounted on every house, and that must be kept in good working order. Needless to say, it is not very bright in our community on moonless nights.

To the best of my knowledge, I am the only person who has contacted postal inspectors. The position of the HOA Board and the property management company is that they made a telephone call to the local post office and were told that the locks were "scheduled" to be changed. They feel that they have met their responsibilities to the homeowners and that no further action is warranted by them. Specifically, they have declined to make an effort to notify homeowners, and they have declined to change the gate code, which is a contentious issue.

The theft of mail, and the theft of packages left by courier services such as UPS and FedEx from doorsteps, is a known problem that has been caught on security cameras in a different neighborhood and broadcast on local TV news. It was taking place in broad daylight.

People become complacent unless they are reminded. I believe that reminders are an important service that could easily be provided by the property management company under the auspices of the HOA Board. Unfortunately, they do not agree with me.

Richard,

I worked for a few years in the self-storage business where we always had gates to deal with.

Your gate operates when a button inside the gate opener box is pressed, completing a circuit. That button may be manually operated, but the circuit may also be completed by means of remote hardware. The garage door openers are one remote means. The keypad is another, as is pressing a key on your telephone.

I suspect that your keypad stores its opening code on a chip located inside the keypad. This is fairly primitive.

The systems we used in the self-storage business were a little more complex but not beyond the financial or technical reach of an HOA. The system consists of a PC, software, a keypad, and a "black box" for completing the circuit to open the gate. The software, keypad, and black box are pretty much proprietary to each vendor. If you change software you usually have to change the box and keypad as well. The software allowed us to assign a unique gate code to each user and each vendor. We usually limited access to our normal business hours, but we could allow access appropriate to each user. The system would also allow us to track who entered and when.

We did run into a problem one time. Our PC ran Windows XP and was connected to the internet via DSL. One night there was an automatic update to Windows that required restarting the PC. We learned this when one of our 24-hour tenants woke us up because he could not get in. We found our PC waiting for someone to enter the password to start Windows. Later that day we removed the password protection and had no more problems.

The PC does not need to be located at the gate but does require hard-wiring to the gate.

The software we used was meant to manage a self-storage and the gate control was just one part of the big picture. I am sure that there is stand-alone gate software available. The two vendors I was familiar with were Sentinel Systems and PTI.

One other thing you may wish to look into is RFID's to replace your garage door openers. These involve using very small chips, like the kind your vet uses to ID your dog. When they get close enough to the gate, the reader recognizes the code and opens the gate. This is also how the Easy-Pass systems work on toll roads. I know very little about these but I would assume that there is also software that would allow you to keep track of who is entering and when. It might even be feasible to give each resident a chip to carry on him to operate the gate or to install the chip on their cars. Shucks, you could probably program it so your dog could open the gate and take himself for a walk.

Richard,

One of the advantages to the software/hardware referred to previously is that someone within the association can do all the programming so you would no longer have to pay the gate company to reprogram codes. BTW, it is likely that all the gate company is doing is pushing a few buttons. Get a copy of the manual from the manufacturer and save yourselves from that $125 charge.

Police and fire access varies a lot by community. If it is urgent enough they will force their way in. In larger cities the fire department will install a key-operated switch to open the gate. They usually have a single key that operates all their switches and a key is located in every vehicle. Aside from the fact that all those keys floating around compromise your security, I have seen several FD installations where wires were left exposed. Anyone with a set of wire cutters could snip the wires, connect them, and open the gate.

I have seen storage operators give the FD a code to get in but when the firemen really need to get in, no one knows who has the code. I saw this happen just last year when a car in storage caught on fire in the middle of the night. The operator lived off-site but had internet access to the video as it all happened. He said he watched the firemen trying to figure out how to get in but the operator had no direct means to either open the gate from his location or communicate directly with the firemen. The FD ended up cutting the padlock on a walk-thru gate and dragged their hoses in through the gate. By then, the car was toast.

In a residential community I would think that there is likely to be someone around to let them in no matter what time of day it is, but you should check with your local FD to see how they like to do things.