The town of Scotland has about 1,500 residents 鈥� and six ZIP codes.
And that鈥檚 created all sorts of issues in the eastern 海角换妻 town: Lost mail. School zoning confusion. Voter registration hiccups. Incomplete vital statistics.
Frustrated town officials are now turning to Congress for help.
U.S. Senator Chris Murphy and U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney are joining forces to address the ZIP code mish-mash. They鈥檝e introduced legislation in Congress to unify the town under one ZIP code.
鈥淚n a town this small, that many ZIP codes leads to some pretty serious problems,鈥� Murphy said during a Friday press conference on the town green. 鈥淧ackages that are delayed for days. Residents who have trouble filing official documents. Tax payments that become unnecessarily overdue. Even schoolchildren who sometimes end up going to the wrong school.鈥�
Or as Courtney, who represents Scotland, put it: 鈥淚t鈥檚 almost comical. I mean, you could do a Monty Python skit.鈥�
Gary Greenberg recently retired as Scotland First Selectman. He said not a week went by during his time in office without constituents coming to Town Hall with problems stemming from the converging ZIP codes.
To complicate matters more, the ZIP codes aren鈥檛 just within Scotland town limits: they extend to neighboring towns. For instance, some Scotland residents have a mailing address for the neighboring town of Hampton.
Greenberg recalls one comical example, 鈥渢he couple who came to town who thought they were moving to Hampton 鈥� they were from the north of England and said that they never would have moved to a town called Scotland.鈥�
But beyond incidents inconveniencing individual residents, having so many ZIP codes complicates the business of local government.
鈥淧ublic health statistics, aggregate income tax, unemployment, household income 鈥� any statistics that sort by ZIP code, which is an awful lot, are wildly inaccurate and, at best, useless,鈥� for Scotland, Greenberg said.
He says it鈥檚 a burden on small-town government.
鈥淟ike all small-town governments, we hang on by our fingernails,鈥� Greenberg said.
Despite hours of trying, town officials had been unsuccessful in seeking help from the United States Postal Service, he said.
鈥淭hey can鈥檛 or won鈥檛 fix the problem, which is why, with the help of Sen. Murphy and Rep. Courtney, we鈥檙e making a federal case,鈥� he said.
Murphy said there鈥檚 also a symbolic reason for unifying under one ZIP code.
鈥淶IP codes become part of your identity,鈥� Murphy said. 鈥淓verybody knows the five numbers of the ZIP code of the town that they grew up in.鈥�
Murphy said ZIP codes 鈥減rovide a sense of cohesion, a sense of identity, a sense of continuity.鈥�
鈥淪o when you get a small town with a close-knit community but six different ZIP codes, it doesn鈥檛 help the effort to try to facilitate that kind of cohesion that a small community wants,鈥� he said.
Murphy said Congress has previously taken up legislation to unify towns from multiple ZIP codes to one, so there鈥檚 precedent for the bill he鈥檚 introduced alongside Courtney.
鈥淚t鈥檒l make life easier for people here in town,鈥� he said, 鈥渁nd we鈥檙e hopeful to get it across the finish line.鈥�
