A digest of events, trends, issues, ideas and journalism from and about rural America, by the Institute for Rural Journalism, based at the University of Kentucky.
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Many Native Americans use mail-in ballots to vote in national elections so they won't have to travel long distances to polling places, but USPS delays could mean those ballots don't make it into the final count, reports Kalle Benallie for Indian Country Today.
Recent proposed federal and state changes have increased panic among Native voters, said Triston Black, director of the Young Peoples Project at Arizona Native Voice. He told Benallie that "it's irresponsible to start a panic during the midterm elections about voting by mail." His organization is encouraging Native voters to keep voting by mail, reassuring them that Tribal ID's are valid personal identification to show proof of citizenship.
Black said that "64 percent of tribal voters living on Navajo, Hopi or White Mountain and Apache lands voted by mail in 2024," and encouraged Native voters who plan to vote by mail to do so as early as possible to avoid mail delays, which can be extreme.
Benallie reports that ballot rejections for missed deadlines increased by 134 percent "in counties where Native Americans make up more than 25 percent of the population" between 2020 and 2024, according to data from the Native American Rights Fund. The report said there is "strong evidence that USPS network disruptions had a significant impact with Native voters."
The U.S. Supreme Court has rejected the Trump Administration's newly proposed vote-by-mail restrictions in a ruling on Monday, reports Hansi Lo Wang for NPR. Such restrictions would have hit rural voters hard because they rely on early voting and vote by mail, according to a report from the nonpartisan policy group Secure Democracy USA.
The proposed rules would have required states to "turn over lists of voters' names and addresses and have certain specific barcodes on ballot envelopes in order to have them delivered" by the USPS.
The measure had been blocked already by two federal judges, and now "a majority of the Supreme Court decided to keep that injunction in place," ruling that "the Trump administration was unlikely to succeed on the merits of its challenge," Wang reports. "Several Republican state election officials," also"signed on to a Supreme Court brief, warning that any attempt to carry out the USPS plan now 'will almost certainly lead to mistakes, delays, and confusion for both voters and election officials.'"
"Voting by mail has already begun in states including Alabama, North Carolina and Wisconsin, with more soon to follow — including Western states such as Hawaii, Oregon and Washington, where elections are held primarily or fully with mail ballots," Wang reports. The USPS plan is paused for the midterms, but Wang writes that "the legal fight will likely continue over how the agency may try to implement it for future federal elections."
The USPS does 'what no other business would do.' (Photo by Victória Kubiaki, Unsplash)
The U.S. Postal Service does what no private company can: It delivers mail 6 days a week to every address in the country at an affordable price. But the business model the USPS has been mandated to use is outdated and has plunged the delivery titan into insurmountable debt. Should the USPS be allowed to go bust? No. Congress needs to address USPS structural problems now, writes The Wall Street Journal editorial board.
Last week, the USPS "reported a $2 billion quarterly loss. 'We are in a cash crisis,' Postmaster General David Steiner said. 'We require urgent Congressional action to expand our borrowing authority and to address outdated constraints on the organization," the board writes. "The important part for lawmakers to hear is that last part."
The USPS business model was implemented when letter delivery and profits were reliable sources of revenue. Since the advent of email, Evites and online communications for almost every business need, the demand for "snail mail" sank, and with it, USPS profits. They write, "Last year the USPS handled 108.7 billion pieces, down 49% from a peak of 213.1 billion in 2006. A majority of what’s left is euphemistically categorized as 'marketing mail.'"
When Steiner testified to the House about the state of USPS finances and its inability to address losses without sizable shifts in its business model, he candidly pointed out the massive demands and their corresponding expenses that the USPS undertakes every day, saying, "We deliver from the tip of Puerto Rico to the tip of Alaska for 78 cents. That’s a distance of 5,000 miles.”
When addressing the House, the "Postmaster laid out two paths: 'First would be to remove the mandates that ensure the Postal Service loses money,'" the board writes, "Second, 'public service reimbursement,' meaning 'payment by Congress in return for the Postal Service doing what no other business would do.'" The editorial board writes, "Start with option one, and let Steiner run the business like a business."
Changes to USPS mail delivery have an outsized impact on rural Americans. (Photo by D. Trinks, Unsplash)
Expensive delivery obligations and government constraints both contribute to the U.S. Postal Service's deepening financial woes. "In testimony to Congress last month, David Steiner, the postmaster general, delivered a dire warning," reports Adam Sella of The New York Times. "Without drastic measures, he said, the U.S. Postal Service could run out of cash in less than a year."
Some of the "drastic measures" Steiner outlined included reducing service days from 6 to 5, dropping "unprofitable routes," and closing some smaller post offices, Sella writes. All three changes would have an outsized impact on rural communities that other carriers, such as FedEx and UPS, avoid due to higher costs.
A large part of the agency's financial turmoil can be blamed on what Congress has tasked it with doing, which doesn't create a profitable business model (which is why UPS and FedEx don't do it), and federal limitations on its financial options, including pricing and pension investments.
For instance, USPS is supposed to be financially self-sufficient while meeting its universal service obligation, which requires it to deliver to everyone in the United States at a reasonable price, Sella explains. "In 2022, Congress added a six-day-a-week delivery requirement. . . .That commitment has cost the agency money: more than $6.5 billion a year."
USPS is also restricted on pricing. "It must get approval from an independent regulatory commission, which limits the agency’s ability to raise prices," Sella reports. Congress also limits its borrowing power, which means it can run out of money.
USPS leadership isn't allowed pension portfolio flexibility, which could have a dramatic impact on its bottom line. Sella explains, "The Postal Service is only allowed to invest its retirement funds in Treasury notes. The Postal Service’s Office of Inspector General estimated in 2023 that USPS retirement funds would have been worth approximately $800 billion more if they had been able to be invested in a mix of 60% stocks and 40% Treasury bonds."
Meanwhile, USPS has turned to one of its few reliable revenue streams: postal price increases. "The commission approved a temporary surcharge of 8% on packages, in light of rising fuel and transportation costs," Sella reports. The Postal Service also requested a 5% increase in first-class mail rates. "That means first-class mail 'forever' stamps would increase from 78 cents to 82 cents."
Rural residents are more dependent on the USPS. (Photo by A. Land, Unsplash)
The U.S. Postal Service can't borrow any more money to cover ongoing deficits, and unless changes to its funding are made, USPS leadership has warned that the service will run out of money sometime in 2026. Elena Patel reports for Brookings. "This fiscal crisis reflects a structural mismatch between what Congress requires the Postal Service to do and how it is financed."
When the USPS was created, its financial foundations included a monopoly on letter delivery tied to a universal service mandate; however, as the number of letters mailed in the U.S. steadily declined beginning in 2007, the universal service requirement remained in place. The lack of letter revenue essentially meant USPS could no longer afford to deliver to all 169 million addresses that Congress mandated it serve with affordable rates.
Once letter revenue tanked, the USPS still delivered to every address despite the financial toll. "The USPS nationwide delivery network ensures that access does not depend on geography or profitability," Patel explains.
Brookings graph, from USPS Form 10-K Operating Statistics, FY 2007–2025.
For rural communities, USPS mail carriers often go the "last mile" to complete a delivery. The mail is a backbone for small-town businesses, finances and even medical care. Patel writes, "Particularly in low-density and rural communities, the mail remains essentialinfrastructure. It delivers prescription medications, ballots, and online purchases, and it supports local small-business activity."
Patel suggests some USPS changes that Congress could enact, which are edited for brevity below.
Restructure pension liability finances, "including shifting these costs to the Treasury, as is done for other federal agencies."
Pay universal service costs: "The cost of the universal service obligation exceeded the value of the postal monopoly by roughly $2-$3 billion per year for the last several years. . . . Congress could fund that mandate explicitly through annual appropriations."
Increase the USPS borrowing cap and allocate funds for infrastructure improvements. "Additional capital flexibility could ease short-term liquidity pressures and allow USPS to finance modernization over time rather than from current cash flows."
Congress can "realign the financing framework with the universal service mandate it has imposed," Patel adds. "Or it can allow liquidity constraints to narrow that mandate by default. In practice, that 'default' path would likely involve deferred payments, delayed investment, and increased pressure for service cuts that fall most heavily on the communities most reliant on the mail."
Delayed newspapers can hurt a publisher's bottom line. (Photo via NiemanLab)
U.S. Postal Service cost-cutting measures and process changes have slowed some local newspaper deliveries to a crawl, leaving frustrated local publishers searching for solutions, reports Sophie Culpepper of NiemanLab.
Smaller, more rural newspapers often use USPS because it is cheaper than hiring newspaper carriers; however, over the past decade, USPS has repeatedly raised postal rates even as its reliability decreased. Culpepper writes, "By the USPS’ own measurement, about 20% of periodicals were delivered late nationally between July 1 and Sept. 30, 2025, up from around 15% delivered late during the same period in 2024."
The Midcoast Villager in Maine is a community newspaper that is the "primary or only local news source for most of the 80,000 residents of Maine’s Knox and Waldo Counties," Culpepper writes. The Villager has tracked papers that are a week or more late. Delayed delivery can irritate readers, who may choose to drop their subscriptions. "Small local publishers can’t afford those losses, and they have little
visibility into — or control over — the delays hurting their bottom
lines."
The Villager's publisher, Willy Blackmore, shared his frustration with USPS in his 2025 editorial: "It bears mentioning that the Postal Service is just that, a service, and not a business that has historically had or needs a profit motive, but it is a service that the Villager spends over $49,000 on annually, and we decidedly are not getting what we pay for."
Rural papers in South Dakota are facing a similar struggle. David Bordewyk, the executive director of the South Dakota NewsMedia Association, told Culpepper, "I’m confident in telling you…100% of our newspapers are having problems with delivery."
In December, a National Newspaper Association delegation met with Postmaster General David Steiner, who used to be a paperboy, to discuss ongoing challenges and request a process for newspapers to enter into the Postal Service’s "delivery measurement system," which includes scans and barcodes that could track a newspaper from beginning to end.
In an update to NNA members, Matt Paxton, a publisher who attended the meeting with Steiner, wrote, "Postmaster General Steiner was attentive. But didn’t indicate that he plans to deviate at this time from the USPS’s Delivering for America Plan."
A USPS postmark is now stamped at regional facilities. (Adobe Stock photo)
Few ink stamps are as crucial to meeting modern deadlines as the U.S. Postal Service postmark; however, at the end of last month, USPS changed its transportation and stamping processes, potentially delaying when mail is physically postmarked.
Beginning on Dec. 24, a postmark "no longer shows the date you deposited a piece of mail with the U.S. Postal Service," reports Esther Fung of The Wall Street Journal. Instead, mail will be postmarked when it's processed at a regional facility, which could be days after it's mailed locally.
The USPS changed its postmark rule "as part of long-running efforts to modernize and cut costs," Fung writes. "Reducing postal-truck runs between processing facilities and local post offices can cut costs and emissions."
While the USPS doesn't classify postmarking as part of "its services," many systems and people, including the Internal Revenue Service, legal professionals, election officials and health insurers, use postmarks as evidence that something mailed met a set deadline.
The best way to ensure an important piece of mail gets postmarked on time is to go to the post office where it can be manually stamped. Fung adds, "Yet, that could be hard for people living in rural areas far from a post office."
For deadline-mandated postmarks on items such as taxes, college applications, and health insurance appeals, experts recommend mailing documents several days in advance, so the mail has time to reach the processing facility for its official postmark.
Maine State Police hope their card deck will generate tips on unsolved cases. (Maine State Police photo via Midcoast Villager)
The Maine State Police are launching a Cold Case Deck of Cards initiative to generate leads for unsolved cases. "The deck features 52 of Maine State Police’s unsolved homicides and suspicious missing person cases and will be distributed to inmates in correctional facilities across the state," reports Jim Leonard of the Midcoast Villager. "This marks the first time the concept has been implemented in Maine. Similar initiatives in more than two dozen states have been credited with helping solve multiple homicide investigations."
Just because cranberries are tart doesn't mean they require a ton of sugar to become tasty. "Diabetics or anyone who wants to reduce the added sugars they’re consuming can try a few culinary tactics to lower their sugar intake while still enjoying this holiday treat," writes food scientist Rosemary Trout for The Conversation. "Don’t cook your cranberries much longer after they pop. You’ll still have a viscous cranberry liquid without the need for as much sugar. … For a richer flavor and a glossy quality, add butter. … Adding chopped walnuts, almonds, or hazelnuts can slow glucose absorption, so your blood glucose may not spike as quickly."
In a tribute to snail mail and history buffs, a new podcast, "People of
Agency," offers listening excursions into "the stories of individuals
who have shaped USPS over its 250-year history," reports
Sean Michael Newhouse of Government Executive. The show is co-created
and co-hosted by Aileen Day, a political communications consultant, and
Maia Warner-Langenbahn, who co-hosts the "Well, I Laughed" podcast. In
the show's first episode, the duo recount the story of Mary Katherine Goddard,
who was "put in charge of Baltimore’s mail in 1775 and printed the
first copy of the Declaration of Independence that listed all of its
signatories."
In a bid to have more control over production and supply, Walmart recently opened its "second U.S.-owned milk processing facility in Valdosta, Ga., a $350-million plant supplying milk to more than 650 Southeast stores," reports Taylor Leach of Dairy Herd. While the company does purchase milk from local farmers, "some critics have warned Walmart buys milk from only a handful of large farms, putting smaller farms under further pressure. … The opening also follows Walmart’s recent investments in case-ready beef plants in Thomasville, Ga., and Olathe, Kansas."
Shaking your real Christmas tree before bringing it into your home can keep bugs from coming inside.
The holidays can be full of surprises, but discovering six-legged stowaways in your freshly cut Christmas tree shouldn't be one of them. "Bringing a real Christmas tree into your warm living room can accidentally wake up thousands of dormant bugs, turning your cozy holiday into a surprise visit from nature," reports Jenn Jordan of The Weather Channel. To prevent insect or spider visitors from entering your home, while your tree is still outside, give it more than one seriously hard shake. Many tree farms use mechanical shakers, which can also do the trick.
From the bubonic plague to cholera pandemicsto deadly staph infections, bacterial illnesses often pose one of the biggest challenges to human survival. But with innovation, microorganisms can also help humans do remarkable things. "In the boulder-strewn desert east of Tucson, Arizona, miners are using sulfuric acid and bacteria to bring online the first new U.S. copper production in more than a decade," reports Ryan Dezember of The Wall Street Journal. Advances in technology are key to how this copper is mined. The enterprise uses "microbes to strip copper from ores that are otherwise uneconomical to mine." The Grand Canyon's state motto just happens to be Ditat Deus, which is Latin for "God Enriches." Last year, 70% of U.S. copper came from Arizona.
A total of 18 states have banned some non-nutritious foods from SNAP purchases. (Axios graph, from USDA data)
More states are restricting junk food purchases with Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits to increase the federal funding they receive. "Six more states agreed to ban the use of SNAP benefits for junk food under new deals with the Trump administration," reports April Rubin of Axios. "The new waivers restrict the purchase of non-nutritious items like soda, energy drinks, certain juices, prepared desserts and candy." While which foods and drinks are restricted varies by state, all states with added nutritional restrictions will all receive more federal dollars to support their SNAP programs.
ProPublica graphic, with data from SSA, Master
Beneficiary Record, 100% data; USPS geographic data; and
Census Bureau, Population Division, 2023 estimates of resident
population.
Changes made to Social Security disability benefits by the Trump Administration could harm 50 to 60-year-old applicants “without a high school or college education who have, for decades, toiled in physically grueling jobs,” Eli Hager reported for ProPublica.
“The five states where the highest proportions of people rely on these benefits are West Virginia, Arkansas, Kentucky, Mississippi and Alabama,” Hager wrote.
Currently, applicants who are at least 50 years old are given priority to redeem disability benefits due to their age. The changes made to the program would mean that age would no longer be a factor in determining eligibility for the benefits.
A senior administration official (who requested anonymity) explained that the current rules reflected the job economy of the 1970s, which mostly relied on manual labor. Now that the internet has created more sedentary jobs, 50-year-olds have more options.
Another change would “modernize the job listings that Social Security’s disability adjudicators and judges use to decide if there’s work available in the U.S. economy that a manual laborer could do despite physical impairments — like a low-skilled desk job at a computer or driving for Uber or DoorDash,” Hager wrote.
But Hager added that Michelle Aliff, who provides expert testimony for Social Security disability hearings, said in an interview that “an oil field roustabout in his 50s isn’t going to just sit down at a computer for work without additional training.”
The USPS will have new leadership who may rethink recent plans. (Photo by Clay Leconey, Unsplash)
Over the past few decades, the United States Postal Service has struggled to stay financially afloat and transition from a letter-delivery service to more of a package-delivery service. USPS leadership has faced an uphill battle to maintain its mission — to accept and deliver mail to every address in the U.S., its territories, and possessions — while remaining solvent.
The last Postmaster General, Louis DeJoy, retired after his 10-year plan, Delivering for America, floundered and repeatedly angered lawmakers. “As a new leader takes the helm of the U.S. Postal Service, a House panel debated the future of the independent entity,” reports Sean Michael Newhouse of Government Executive. “There was a near-universal consensus on pausing and even reversing" DeJoy's plans.
Mike Plunkett, the CEO and president of the Association for Postal Commerce, told the panel, “Under the Delivering for America plan, our members have suffered unprecedented rate increases and service degradation. . . . If the incoming PMG is to have any chance at success, the postal service must immediately pause implementation of Delivering for America.”
Plunkett suggested a “moratorium on rate increases, a pause in spending on building new facilities and halting any product changes while new leadership assesses what reforms to keep, modify or unwind,” Newhouse writes. “Jim Cochrane, the CEO of the Package Shippers Association, a trade organization, testified that USPS needs a ‘new vision’ to improve its finances.”
David Steiner, who previously served as the CEO of Waste Management and as a member of the FedEx board, was selected by the bipartisan USPS Board of Governors to become the next Postmaster General.
“DeJoy was pressured to resign [in March] due to conflicts with the Department of Government Efficiency," Newhouse reports. “President Donald Trump, who reportedly backed Steiner, has mused about privatizing USPS or folding it under the Commerce Department.”
USPS has the largest physical and logistical infrastructure of any non-military government institution. (Photo via IPR)
The U.S. Postal Service continues its uphill battle to modernize its processes and manage its financial woes. Meanwhile, it faces a new challenge -- the possibility of privatization by the Trump administration. Mail carriers and advocates believe privatizing the USPS would leave rural residents facing slower and fewer mail deliveries.
"In recent weeks, President Donald Trump and Elon Musk have floated the idea of privatizing U.S. mail services," reports Michael Livingston of Interlochen Public Radio, which serves northern Michigan. "Trump said he’s considering putting USPS under the control of the Commerce Department, which he says will help fix declining profits at USPS. The agency has been independent and mostly self-funded since 1970."
Letter carriers oppose the change, with Trump and Musk's discussion leading to "mass protests by postal workers and letter carriers across the country last month. A national 'day of action' took place in more than 150 cities on March 20," Livingstone adds. "Letter carriers say that would be detrimental to rural areas . . ."
Doug Bartlett, president of the Michigan Rural Letter Carriers Association, told Livingston, "If a private company comes in and takes over the post office, they're going to cherry-pick where they can make money, and that's going to be our urban areas, short distances to get out and deliver stuff. And it's going to be our rural areas that'll be poor."
The USPS delivers to every address in the nation, which means its carriers are the ones getting checks, medicines and election ballots to the most remote-living Americans. Any changes to its services mean rural areas will likely be impacted. Bartlett told Livingston, "Rural delivery out in the real rural areas could be cut back to maybe as much as one or two days a week. That would be devastating for people that need those items."
More than 100 rural letter carriers gathered to rally against USPS privatization. (The Daily Yonder photo)
Rural letter carriers from around the country gathered last week at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. to "rally in support of the U.S. Postal Service, which they said faces an increasing threat of privatization under President Donald Trump," reports Julia Tilton for The Daily Yonder. "The rally was attended by members of Congress from both sides of the aisle."
The event also announced the "launch of the NRLCA’s National Campaign to Protect the U.S. Postal Service from Privatization, which the union said is its top priority to preserve what it calls a 'critical institution that serves rural America and the country at large,'" Tilton writes. "Approximately 51.3 million rural addresses would be disproportionately impacted by the privatization of the USPS, according to NRLCA National President Don Maston."
Part of the USPS service mandate is to get mail and packages across the "last miles," which can add to delivery expenses. Tilton explains, "It is unprofitable for private companies to deliver mail to the end of long dirt roads located 50 or 100 miles from the nearest post office, Maston said. Privatization would add surcharges to such rural deliveries, which include essential goods like prescription medications and documents like Social Security checks and ballots."
Maston told the Yonder: “Rural Americans rely on rural carriers. In fact, the entire community relies on the rural carrier, and that sense of community would be taken away, and the disproportionately impacted group in the Postal Service would be rural carriers, rural Americans, and rural communities.”
Rally speakers "called for bipartisan support for House Resolution 70, a resolution in the House of Representatives that affirms the Postal Service’s role as a federal institution and opposes privatization," Tilton adds. "Since being introduced at the end of January, the resolution has garnered 180 cosponsors. . . . After the rally, more than 100 rural postal workers headed to meetings with members of Congress to ask for their support in backing the USPS."
After four difficult years, DeJoy is stepping down from his post. (Adobe Stock photo)
Earlier this week, Postmaster General Louis DeJoy announced plans to step down "capping a contentious tenure since his 2020 appointment during the first Trump administration," reports Ester Fung of The Wall Street Journal. "The U.S. Postal Service didn’t provide a date for DeJoy’s exit." His resignation comes as the USPS continues to roll out its 10-year turnaround plan.
With only modest improvements, increased debts and persistent delivery problems at the Postal Service, some lawmakers have regularly grilled DeJoy for what they see as a failed strategy. Fung reports, "The Postal Regulatory Commission, the federal agency that oversees the Postal Service, last month criticized his plan as having 'overly optimistic and unsubstantiated financial projections for cost savings' and said it could hurt rural communities."
DeJoy has repeatedly defended his plans and pointed out that "when he first arrived at the Postal Service, it was in 'devastating condition' and resistant to change, and faced excessive regulatory oversight," Fung adds.
Some of DeJoy's restructuring plans were successful, "including
consolidating routes, replacing aging vehicles and improving working
conditions in several facilities," Fung explains. "The agency has also
taken market share in small packages from private-sector rivals such as
FedEx and UPS as it ferries more parcels over longer distances, not just
for final-mile deliveries."
Even with improved small package
revenues, the Postal Service continues to lose money. Fung adds,
"In 2024, the agency reported a net loss of $9.5 billion, which, after
adjusting for workers’ compensation and retirement liabilities, resulted
in a controllable loss of $1.8 billion." The Postal service does not
rely on federal funding to pay its bills. Instead, it depends on the
sale of postage, products and other services to cover its costs.
DeJoy's exit may not come as a surprise. "The Trump White House had been considering replacing DeJoy, according to two people familiar with the matter," Fung adds, "though the postmaster general is typically chosen by the board and not the president."
Despite its struggles, 72% of Americans see the USPS favorably. (Adobe Stock photo)
The United States Postal Service is hemorrhaging money while struggling to complete its basic mission of delivering mail to American citizens.
An advisory review by the Postal Regulatory Commission found that Postmaster General Louis DeJoy’s 'Delivering for America' plan "offers ‘little convincing evidence’ its reform plans will succeed," reports Eric Katz of Government Executive. PRC said planned USPS reforms could negatively impact rural service areas.
In its review, PRC "examined two parts of DeJoy’s plan: its Regional Transportation Optimization initiative, which requires mail to sit overnight at post offices instead of being collected each evening for transportation to a processing center, and its processing plant consolidations that will result in the 60 regional processing distribution centers," Katz explains. PRC regulators said the initiatives lacked planning and were unlikely to streamline work, increase efficiency and produce impactful savings.
Regulators noted how the USPS was "glossing over how much more significantly rural communities would feel the impacts of the changes," Katz reports. "Some populations will not receive First-Class mail pieces for six or more days, it said. Those impacts may render the reforms in violation of the law, the commission added."
USPS has not responded to PRC's recommendations; however, DeJoy "previously promised to lawmakers he would take the PRC’s opinion seriously and tweak his plan as he saw fit," Katz writes. "PRC made more than three dozen recommendations for updating DeJoy’s reforms. . . . Postal management also recently announced lower on-time delivery targets for 2025."
U.S. Postal Service history dates back to 1775. Its goal was to deliver mail. (Photo by Joel Moysuh, Unsplash)
Postmaster General Louis DeJoy deployed plans to make the U.S. Postal Service profitable. But turning a profit isn't the point of mail delivery, write Tribune Phonograph editorial members Kris O’Leary and Brian Wilson. Service is the heart of the USPS, and its lack significantly impacts rural areas.
"The U.S Postal Service should focus on delivering the mail, not delivering a profit," they write. "Privatization of the postal service has been a dream for some who see the opportunity for profit, but it would be a nightmare for rural Americans who would see service cuts, additional delays and increasing costs. These would disproportionally impact rural residents simply due to the economics of having fewer potential customers over a wider area."
In many business ventures, privatization "can be a wonderful thing. . . . . It can bring about innovation. . . and the adoption of new efficiencies," O'Leary and Wilson add. "In a recent interview, President-elect Donald Trump broached the idea of revisiting privatization of the postal service as a potential goal. . . . Trump’s comments come at the same time that Postal Service leadership is under increased bipartisan scrutiny for spiraling increases in rates and ever-diminishing service standards."
In a December congressional hearing, members berated DeJoy for failing to meet service benchmarks and repeated upgrade delays. "Georgia Rep. Rich McCormick, a Republican, lambasted DeJoy," the editorial board writes, "leading to DeJoy covering his ears during the hearing." DeJoy defended his optimization strategies and said lawmaker interference could "end" the Postal Service.
However, profit-margin goals have little to do with the Postal Service's actual purpose. O'Leary and Wilson write, "DeJoy and other postal leadership have lost sight, if they ever had it, of the service that is at the core of the Postal Service. If DeJoy’s version of operational leadership and strategy were applied to highways, we would see interstates being turned into gravel roads."
If the U.S. postal service is privatized, its goal will become profits above all. "It will funnel off large city metro areas that can make money and drop rural areas that cover more land miles than people," O'Leary and Wilson add. "This is most of the U.S. population not living on either population-dense coast. The Midwest could lose any mail or package service if this becomes a reality. . ."
Sen. Josh Hawley, 'hates' Dejoy's plan and vowed to try and 'kill it.'
Tempers flared as the U.S. Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee and Postmaster General Louis DeJoy wrangled over the U.S. Postal Service's lagging delivery, expenses and DeJoy's overall postal "optimization" plan, reports Eric Katz of Route Fifty. "DeJoy vehemently defended his efforts and said the senators standing in his way would bring about the end of the Postal Service."
The bipartisan pushback put DeJoy on the defensive and highlighted internal conflicts between DeJoy and Congress. "Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., became angry with DeJoy when discussing his plan to slow down delivery for some mail, which is expected to disproportionately impact rural areas," Katz writes. "Hawley said, 'I hate this plan and I’m going to do everything I can to kill it.' The senator raised his voice and said he was no longer interested in being nice to DeJoy, was growing tired of his initiatives, and had 'waited and waited and waited' for improved performance."
After prickly exchanges about who or what would "go down with the ship," Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., who chairs the committee, "said he will follow up with the Postal Regulatory Commission on its review of DeJoy’s changes, which is due out in January," Katz explains. "Its findings are non-binding, and Peters said he will demand answers if postal management ignores the commission’s recommendations.
Several lawmakers criticized DeJoy's 'Regional Transportation Optimization' plan that "will require mail to sit overnight at post offices instead of being collected each evening for transportation to a processing center," Katz reports. "USPS paused those efforts in the run up to the election and its annual holiday busy season, but has vowed to resume them early next year."
Committee members zeroed in on USPS 2025 delivery targets, which were reduced, leaving next year's goals less robust than those from 2024. "For example, it expects to deliver regular cards and letters slated for two-day delivery on time just 87% of the time in fiscal 2025 compared to its goal of 93% in fiscal 2024," Katz adds. "The Postal Service also recently announced its intention to deliver some mail more slowly."
Jon Ossoff, D-Ga, asked "why Georgia is currently only seeing 75% of mail delivered on time, despite a promise this spring that USPS would be 'where we need to be' within 60 days," Katz reports. "DeJoy said the current performance level would remain as is for the foreseeable future. . . . Ossoff made clear he did not think DeJoy was doing enough and when the postmaster general said his attacks were becoming personal, the senator countered that he was reflecting the concerns of his constituents."
Rossif Sutherland and Kristin Kreuk star in the new Global/FOX
series 'Murder in a Small Town.' (Global TVvia IMDb photo/The Daily
Yonder)
There's nothing quite like small-town murder tales to get people glued to their television screens week after week. "The latest TV series on FOX puts its own spin on a genre that has stood the test of time," reports Keith Roysdon of The Daily Yonder. "We haven’t yet reached the point where it’s become obvious that something is very, very wrong in the town of Gibsons . . . . 'Murder in a Small Town' is good, dependable murder-of-the-week television, probably not dissimilar to how 'Murder, She Wrote' was perceived for most of its run."
In Lancaster County, Penn., Democrats see an opportunity even though the county typically votes Republican, "the demographics are shifting here and throughout the state," report Campbell Robertson and Robert Gebeloff of The New York Times. "Pennsylvania is arguably the most pivotal state in the election, carrying 19 electoral votes, the most of the so-called swing states. After voting for the Democrat in every presidential election going back to 1992, the state went for Donald J. Trump in 2016 by less than a percentage point. Joe Biden won in 2020, by a little over a percentage point."
Jim
and Sharon Erwin enjoy the natural beauty of Gunnison, Colo.(Photo by Jim Erwin via WSJ)
As baby boomers head into retirement, some choose to resettle in rural places for reasons that range from cutting costs to living closer to natural attractions. "The move to remote mountain and lake areas is helping reverse a long decline in the rural population. From April 2020 to July 2023, the rural counties retirees flocked to grew 4% versus less than 1% for rural America as a whole," report Anne Tergesen and Veronica Dagher of The Wall Street Journal.
If slower is cheaper, is that OK? That depends. "The U.S. Postal Service is moving forward with a plan to slow down delivery for a relatively small portion of mail, telling its regulator the changes would save nearly $4 billion annually and better reflect the evolving nature of mail usage," reports Eric Katz of Route Fifty. Advocates for rural residents say the change will disproportionately affect mail delivery and pickup in more remote areas. Liz Carey of The Daily Yonderreports, "The plan would eliminate evening mail pickup in rural and remote areas, which could affect delivery times for areas that are more than 50 miles from a large USPS regional processing facility."
Apple's AirPods Pro 2 with hearing aid feature (Apple photo via Wired)
Over-the-counter hearing aids seemed like a "cheaper and more accessible [solution] for people with mild to moderate hearing loss. Instead, people are returning them at high rates," reports Julie Jargon of The Wall Street Journal. "Doctors lauded the move as a solution for over 20 million American adults who have hearing loss that isn’t severe enough to warrant expensive prescription devices. In reality, many go for $1,500 to $2,000 . . . . The struggles come as Apple prepares to release a potential game-changer — a software update that will turn its popular, $249 AirPods Pro 2 into hearing aids."
This year's spooky season will be topped off by rarely-seen cosmic visitors. "In the days leading up to Halloween, Tsuchinshan-ATLAS, also known as Comet C/2023 A3, will be at its brightest, and likely visible to the naked eye. . . just look to the western sky shortly after sunset. As the days pass, the comet will get fainter and move to a higher part of the sky," reports James Wray for The Conversation. "The second comet, C/2024 S1 (ATLAS), should be visible around the end of October. The comet will pass closest to Earth on Oct. 24 – look low in the eastern sky just before sunrise. Then, after swinging around the Sun, the comet may reappear in the western night sky right around Halloween."
The following report is from John Galer, chair of the National
Newspaper Association and publisher of The Journal-News in Hillsboro,
Illinois.
On June 28, the National Newspaper Association delivered letters from more than 200 newspaper titles to the Postal Regulatory Commission, complaining about inadequate mail delivery and escalating postage rates.
The comments were part of a review by the PRC of its postal rate regulations, which it is required by Congress to do periodically. The commission last completed a rate review in 2021 at which time it gave the U.S. Postal Service authority to raise postage rates beyond inflation levels. The result for community newspapers has been an increase by 35-50 percent in postage costs in the past four years.
The PRC announced earlier this year, following widespread complaints by mail users, that it would initiate a new inquiry on its regulations. Its determination will set USPS’s legal authority to increase rates for at least five years.
NNA Chair John Galer, publisher of the Journal-News, Hillsboro, IL, asked NNA members and newspapers in state newspaper organizations to send him their thoughts on the impact of the past few years of postage increases.
Responses registered a state of alarm on the future of the industry, specific complaints about delivery failures, losses of subscribers and unresponsive local postal authorities when delivery was not properly executed. Galer included the letters in NNA’s comments to the commission. NNA is also working with mailing industry partners on more detailed comments on the mechanisms involved in the rate regulation, including one provision that allows USPS to increase rates more when mail volume declines, which many in the industry consider a reward for poor performance.
“NNA has met with the commission recently to explain our situation,” Galer said. “We needed the commissioners to understand that this situation cannot continue. The PRC is inclined to blame the Postmaster General for using every inch of rate authority that the commission extended. But it was the commission that laid the table for this disaster. With proper rate regulation, we would not be in the situation we now find ourselves in. Now, we have to be concerned not only for the future of our own newspapers but for the plummeting of mail volumes that threatens the very basis of universal mail service. It was not unusual this year to see complaints not only about late newspaper delivery but also about checks in the mail arriving slowly or not at all. Even first-class mail has become unreliable in many areas.”
Public comments are being accepted by the PRC until July 9.
The Postal Service boasts a 'jaw-dropping' 77% approval rating. (Photo by Victória Kubiaki, Unsplash)
While Americans may not use the U.S. Postal Service as often as they did 20 years ago, it remains "a universally beloved federal agency. . . . second only to the Parks Service
in public favorability (a jaw-dropping 77% approval rating, per Gallup ), writes Vishal Shankar in his opinion essay for Common Dreams, "The Public Has a Right to Know Every Detail of Louis DeJoy's Destructive Agenda." The Postal Service is arguably also the most frequently-interacted-with component of
the federal government: packages and letters are delivered to Americans'
mailboxes six days per week. But many of the Postal Service operations are changing under DeJoy, and critics say his leadership has led to slower delivery, significant price increases and less accountability. With a Postal Board of Governors as the only
body that can censor or fire DeJoy, the public must stand up for what
they hold dear, according to Shankar. "The future of the people's most treasured public
institution depends on public participation and feedback."
At a time when public trust in government is at near historic lows, the Board and Dejoy have worked to restrict public access to comment or meeting participation. "At least four times per year, the Board "holds an open session meeting, its sole formal contact with the public. In recent years, these meetings have concluded with a well-attended public comment period, where in-person and virtual attendees have excoriated DeJoy for embracing a privatization-friendly agenda," Shankar explains. "Just this year alone, public commenters at Board meetings have decried the mail slowdowns and price hikes, demanded changes to DeJoy's gas-guzzling and union-busting fleet plan, raised serious concerns about transparency of DeJoy's facility consolidation plans, and pushed DeJoy to expand community services offered at the post office."
But in its last open session meeting in November, the Board banned public attendance and comments without explaining why. "This abrupt new barrier to public accessibility led the number of public commenters – which in recent meetings has been a double-digit tally – to drop to 4," Shankar adds. "The decline in attendance was also likely compounded by an unexplained shift in the meeting time: whereas past meetings have been held at 4:00 pm ET, Tuesday's session was held at noon – the middle of the workday."
The Board began suppressing public input before this November's meeting. "At the August 2023 meeting, each public commenter was allotted only 25 seconds to speak, in sharp contrast to the typical 3-minute time limit," Sharkar notes." But next year, the Postal Board's accountability problem will worsen. Postal Board Deputy Secretary Lucy Trout explained that starting next year, the Postal Board will only hear public comments once per year in November. In other words, though the next three Postal Board meetings (February, May, and August 2024) are ostensibly 'public sessions," members of the public will have no opportunity to inform the Postal Board about their concerns until a year from now."
The Postal Board needs to drop its suppressive tactics and "reverse course by allowing both in-person and virtual public comments at all open sessions next year, and take further steps to improve accountability by responding to public comments and posting recorded comment sessions to the USPS website," Sharkar writes. "Congressional Democrats and the Biden administration must publicly call out this shameful barrier to transparent government and fast-track filling Postal Board seats with anti-DeJoy, pro-accountability reformers. . . .The future of the people's most treasured public institution depends on public participation and feedback – that's how public service works."
To read a detailed account of USPS history under DeJoy's leadership and ideas on how to engage with the Postal Service, click here.
The U.S. Postal Service is proposing a 7.3 percent increase in the cost for newspapers to mail to in-county subscribers next year – a rate described as “punitive” by a representative of the National Newspaper Association.
The large increase for in-county mail, to take effect Jan. 21, is almost four times higher than proposed increases for other types of mail, including first-class delivery, according to an NNA press release.
The proposed increases come at a time when some daily newspapers are considering switching or have already switched from carrier delivery to the mail, including a recent announcement by three Gannett Co. papers in South Carolina that they would move to USPS delivery on Oct. 10.
“It certainly seems as if the Postal Service wants to discourage newspapers from using the mail,” said John Galer, chair of the NNA board and publisher of The Journal-News in Hillsboro, Illinois. “At a time when local journalism is already in peril and more newspapers are using the mail to reach subscribers, this increase is simply punitive.
“We expect both our subscribers and other stakeholders in our community to push back at the subscription increases that will be made necessary by the Postal Service’s action,” Galer said in the NNA release.
According to the NNA, proposed increases for other types of mail – including those used primarily by other competitors to newspapers – will be much smaller. Those average increases include 1.9 percent for first class and advertising mail, and 1.59 percent for mail delivered outside of a publishers’ home county, which is a rate used for some local newspaper subscriptions but also for national publications.
“Ironically, the Postal Service’s principal justification for the steep increase is that the PRC (Postal Regulatory Commission) now requires USPS to share more of the savings created when publishers do some of the work that postal workers would otherwise have to do, such as presorting the mail and transporting it to destination post offices,” NNA said.
“Raising our prices so it can claim it is creating a fair discount is the sort of math we associate with shady deals,” Galer said. “Our industry has been doing a lot of mail preparation work for years to help keep postal costs down. For us to now be punished for that work simply adds outrage to our disappointment.”
Steven Waldman, head of Rebuild Local News, said on LinkedIn, "Amidst a democracy-threatening crisis in local news, the federal government is now actively making the local news crisis worse. . . . Maybe the Postal Service doesn't want to listen to James Madison and George Washington (subsidize the press!), but at least don’t penalize it. The Founding Fathers believed subsidizing postal rates was crucial to building up the free press and therefore the Republic. Instead, the Postal Service actively undermines the press's survival."
