Postal service's POStPlan for small post offices gets a hearing, and an unexpected cross-examiner

The good folks at Save The Post Office have provided a handy recap of the history of the proposed POStPlan, the U.S. Postal Service's plan for small post offices. This refresher course is pertinent after last week's testimony by Jeffrey Day, USPS retail-operations manager, before the Postal Regulatory Commission.

Day, the only USPS witness for the plan, was there to be cross-examined about the reduction in hours at 13,000 post offices. "There wasn’t much in the way of Perry Mason moments, and judging by the questions from the commissioners and the PRC’s public representative, there doesn’t seem to be a lot of opposition to POStPlan," Save The Post Office reports. "With the two postmasters associations both on board, it appears that only the [American Postal Workers Union] is interested in challenging the plan, and its concern seems to be who’s going to be staffing the POStPlan offices."

Opposing the plan was attorney Elaine Mittleman, who has been helping to save post offices after her office in Pimmit, Va., was closed last year. She was in the hearing room to question Day. "Whatever flaws there may be in the advisory opinion process," Save the Post Office notes, "the fact that an average citizen, officially representing just herself, could join the commissioners in the questioning says a lot about the commission’s commitment to transparency and public participation." (Read more)