Four members of Missouri’s congressional delegation are questioning the head of the U.S. Postal Service about slowing mail and a proposal they say would delay mail even further amid rising prices.
The members of the U.S. House, including Rep. Jason Smith, R-Salem, are questioning major delays of mail sorted in the St. Louis area and call for an investigation to determine why mail is delivered late and inconsistent for many of their constituents. It also calls for a review of shortcomings, delays in the delivery of absentee ballots during elections and the proposal to further delay delivery for rural areas in a letter to Postmaster Louis DeJoy.
“While we are all incredibly thankful for the vital service that our letter carriers provide, we are concerned that their hands are tied because of unacceptable failures at Sorting and Delivery Centers due to ineffective USPS leadership,” they wrote to DeJoy.
Smith and his colleages, Sam Graves, Ann Wagner and Blaine Luetkemeyer want answers by DeJoy by Oct. 1.
“Small businesses rely on the Postal Service to deliver time-sensitive legal documents. Seniors in rural Missouri rely on the Postal Service to deliver life-saving medicine. Our constituents have been assessed late fees on bills to the major delays at mail distribution centers. People even rely on USPS to exercise their constitutional right to vote,” the Congress members wrote. “By failing to live up the agency’s primary mission, the USPS is actively putting our constituents at risk of losing their homes, vehicles, lives and Constitutional protected freedoms.”
Proposals under consideration by the Postal Service would further hurt rural Missouri, they claim. “In effect, we believe these changes would effectively create a two-tiered mail system, wherein rural Americans are treated like second class citizens and subject to even more egregious delays,” they wrote.
“The bottom line is that our constituents depend on USPS and cannot afford these continued failures. Submitting a plan to further delay mail deliveries for rural Americans while continuing to increase postal rates because USPS leadership cannot effectively run their operation is totally unacceptable. Quite simply, Americans don’t want to pay more for worse service.”
He should go to D.C. and thank no joy DeJoy, the Postmaster General. His attacks on Post Offices in this country have caused unheard of mail delays and many General Mail Facilities have been shut down.
Please don’t blame the local USPS, the employees are still doing their best to get your mail to you on time.