The Gearhart Post Office on Pacific Way.

GEARHART — Confusion between addresses in Seaside and Gearhart is driving an attempt to bring a new ZIP code to Gearhart. Gearhart residents hope to persuade the U.S. Postal Service to issue a new ZIP code to the city in order to prevent delivery mix-ups and delays.

“If I’m ordering online and I give my ZIP code and I say Gearhart, and they, on the other end of the line, they say, ‘No, it’s Seaside,’ and you have to explain the whole thing,” City Councilor Reita Fackerell said.

Gearhart postal clerk Karynn Kozij described the situation as “massive confusion.”

“Companies send out text messages saying their packages are being held at 97138,” Kozij said. “A lot of my customers who are new to the area, not knowing that I have their package here at Gearhart, go to Seaside by mistake.”

Not only homeowners, but businesses that rely on property addresses could benefit from the change, including real estate agents and emergency responders.

City Councilor Brent Warren, a proponent of the change, said numbered streets and lettered streets — in Gearhart, they are streets; in Seaside, they are avenues — are especially troublesome.

“It creates delays in the mail,” Warren said. “And obviously, when things are misdirected, they have to be fixed and researched, so that’s problematic.”

Gearhart will present a resolution to U.S. Rep. Suzanne Bonamici and regional postal officials seeking a new ZIP code and an independent post office.

Gearhart became a contract station of Seaside in 1961, when the post office struggled with outdated equipment, crowded facilities, underpaid workers and an ineffective management structure. The decision saved the post office about $1,700 a year.

The Gearhart Post Office moved in 1995 from a space in the Pacific Way Cafe to its location at 546 Pacific Way. In 2003, the city attempted to address the ZIP code issue with a request to a coordinator for the regional district.

Many coastal communities with populations considerably smaller than Gearhart have been assigned their own unique ZIP codes, staff wrote in the draft resolution presented to the City Council at the October meeting.

It is possible to request a ZIP code boundary review by writing to the district manager for the region, Bonamici’s district representative, Ali Mayeda, wrote Warren. “The boundary review process requires any municipality and community group seeking a ZIP code change to submit the request in writing to the manager of the district, with any rationale and justification,” she wrote. “This request can only be made once every 10 years.”

Mayeda asked the city to prepare and send a request to the congresswoman’s office. The district manager must provide a determination within 60 days, and the Postal Service conducts a formal survey of customers who would be affected.

If a simple majority of respondents support the change, the Postal Service usually grants an approval, she said.

“I can’t see the downside to this, so I would ask that we adopt the resolution and get going on it,” Warren said.