Editorial: ‘Postal’ and ‘service’ don’t go together

There is a value to small-town post offices that goes well beyond a profit-and-loss statement. The U.S. Postal Service, that quasi-private, misnamed, bureaucratic monster, doesn’t get that. Since it became a curious private/government hybrid, the concept of “service” has been shunted aside by a drive to be a profit-making enterprise.

Benjamin Franklin, the nation’s first postmaster, would not approve.

There’s no telling when the latest round of small post office closings will crank up. The service (just writing it makes my teeth hurt) has not released a list of targets. But if the criteria for closures are remote location, mail volume and availability of alternative service, it’s not too difficult to identify offices the service would shutter.

Before the nonperforming agency became the U.S. Postal Service, it was the U.S. Post Office. Fees were reasonable; mail service was excellent. Mail carriers and postmasters were in sync with their communities. They walked the neighborhoods, delivering to each home, not to a bank of boxes at the end of the street.

full editorial by Jack Zaleski, IN-Forum

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