Southeast Missourian - Opinion: Saving our rural post offices: going the last mile

Op-Ed

By Claire McCaskill

I have fond memories of growing up in rural Missouri. One of my favorites is the two-block walk I would take with my great-uncle, from the local drugstore he ran, to the local post office.

That post office, like so many across Missouri and the country, was at the center of our small town -- open to businesses and families six days a week.

Today, if we let our postal system -- the greatest in the world -- lose its edge, it's our small towns that will suffer most. It's the seniors who depend on the postal service for prescription drugs, and the small business owners who rely on it to ship packages, who will take the hit.

These post offices are more than just brick and mortar. They're the lifeblood of rural Missouri, and it's critically important we fight to keep them open. That's what I've been working to do, because we can't balance the Postal Service's books on the backs of our small towns.

That fight paid off recently with some temporary progress, when the Postal Service announced it will indefinitely postpone its planned closings of 68 mail processing facilities -- including the processing facility in Cape Girardeau. Along with a bipartisan group of colleagues, I'd urged the Postal Service to put a moratorium on these closings to avoid unfairly hurting consumers, and to allow the Postal Service to save jobs and continue to run efficiently in rural areas.

I used to be Missouri's State Auditor, and I've always believed the best way to solve problems was to first get a firm understanding of the facts on the ground. That's why last week, I asked the country's top watchdog to review mail delivery times at the Postal Service. We've got to know the full scope of the delay issues facing folks in our rural communities, so we can ensure they're properly fixed.

Ultimately, members of Congress have to roll up our sleeves and do the work of hammering out a long-term solution for the problems confronting the Postal Service. We can't allow it to fail or simply say, "let privatization take over" -- knowing full well that private companies won't be the solution to keeping these services thriving throughout Missouri. Even now, those private companies actually rely on the Postal Service to go the last miles in rural areas they simply can't reach.

For the past several years, I've worked with my colleagues to pass legislation to reform the Postal Service. To gain my support, any reform legislation has to protect rural postal customers. I'm currently working with my colleagues on a bill that would restore overnight delivery, return a faster First-Class mail standard, make six-day delivery permanent, and enact strict criteria the Postal Service would have to meet before closing a post office.

Last year, I was proud to help spearhead an effort to protect mail processing facilities and preserve six-day delivery. And at the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee's very first meeting this year, I told my colleagues in no uncertain terms that we have to prioritize these and other reforms or else risk losing a vital service connecting our communities. I'll keep up that fight for these priorities as Congress again considers postal reform this year.

I've made it clear to my colleagues that I'm going to keep working as hard as I know how to ensure we protect this service, and allow it to thrive across the country. And they know I don't shy away from a fight.

The strength of our Postal Service is that it is reliable, affordable and that it goes to the very last mile.

And I'm going the last mile to protect it.

U.S. Senator Claire McCaskill was born in Rolla, Missouri, and is a senior member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee

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