New postmaster delivered warm welcome

After working in the United States Postal Service for the last 20 years, Tim Huskey is back home in Tennessee. He began serving as postmaster in McMinnville on June 9.

Originally from Knoxville, he started his postal career in 1987 in Nashville. For the last 17 years he has been in management. He has been postmaster in McEwen, Camden and Wartrace, Tenn., as well as Indianola, Miss.

He comes to McMinnville from Mississippi. With family in the area, he and his wife were more than willing to relocate.

‘We wanted to come home,’ said Huskey. ‘My wife also works in a post office and she is in Lynchburg. When this position opened up, I jumped at it. It brought me back to Tennessee and I’ve very thankful for that.’

Huskey considers employees like family. He has worked at other places with this philosophy in mind but McMinnville still surprised him.

‘This office is phenomenal,’ said Huskey. ‘There are employees here who are absolutely phenomenal. The employees here are like a big family.’

The employees’ commitment to the community was also a surprise to the new postmaster. Employees participate in the Voice of the Employee program that grades them on performance. If their scores are high enough, they are given a monetary awarded that can be spent any way they wish. Instead of buying something for themselves, the money is always given to non-profit organizations.

‘I’ve never seen employees give back to the community like they do here,’ said Huskey. ‘It’s a consensus. They say let’s find somebody who needs it and give it to them and that’s it. That’s great. They are fixing to do it again.’

The third quarter scores are in and the employees have one of the highest scores in the district and considerably higher than the national average. As usual, employees have already begun discussing which organization will get the donation.

As well as donating their VOE monetary award, post office employees volunteer with the annual food bank collection.

‘The employees here care for the community and that is a great thing,’ said Huskey. ‘To me that is what the post office is all about. The last name in our business is service and that is what we need to do.’

The community has been warm to Huskey’s arrival.

‘Several people have come in to welcome me here and I’ve never had that before either,’ said Huskey. ‘I can walk down the sidewalk and they stop me and say, ‘You’re the new postmaster glad to have you here,’ and that’s a surprise to me.’

Given time to settle in, Huskey plans to get as involved in the community as possible.