(MintPress) – As talks of closing hundreds of United States Postal Service branches escalated late last year, protests quickly followed. In a sign that the postal service has not become a mere oversight in a growing protest culture, reports over the weekend detailed the arrest of 12 demonstrators at a rally to protect the postal branches across the county at the University Station post office in Portland, Oregon.
Twelve of the more than 100 protesters at the event – which included labor unions, neighborhood organizations and members of the Occupy Portland movement – were cited for criminal trespassing after they refused to leave the post office branch after it had closed.
Last year, it was initially announced that 252 mail processing centers and 3,700 local post offices would face closure in light the budget woes facing the mail provider, forcing 100,000 lost jobs. The postal service is forecasted to lose $14.1 billion this year.
The closings were delayed, however, and were scheduled to resume this month. In an about-face, the plans were scrapped altogether earlier this month. The Postal Service has said it will drastically reduce the hours of operation in most of its rural locations to as little as two hours of operation per day. Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe told the Washington Post that it was the only way to spare the rural operations.
“When we announced those closures, what people said to us was, ‘Keep our post office open,’” Donahoe said. “We have to have shorter hours. But if we can shrink the labor costs, we can keep the buildings open.”
But plans to close a swath of mail sorting hubs remains intact, and the decision has produced widespread demonstrations against the U.S. Postal Service and Donahoe.
As the Postal Service responds to a sharp decrease in revenues due to shrinking mail volume created by the ubiquitous usage of email, some argue that Donahoe was too quick to propose cuts to the system instead of negotiating with Congress.
“The Postmaster General’s plan to close processing plants, delay mail delivery, and cut hours in the nation’s post offices will not fix the postal service’s financial crisis,” said Jamie Partridge, an arrestee from Occupy Portland in a press release. “Congress manufactured the crisis and Congress or the President will fix it. If the PMG can’t wait, he should step down and allow in someone who will protect the postal service.”
In a 2007 Congressional mandate, the USPS was required to pre-pay for 75 years of health benefits for retirees in advance within a decade. As of late last year, the mandate had already cost the USPS $21 million, according to Fredric Rolando, president of the National Association of Letter Carriers. Rolando says the mandate now accounts for 84 percent of the Postal Service’s red ink.
“It’s diverted the Postal Service’s focus from developing a business plan to meet the needs of an evolving society, and forced it into a frenzied effort to annually find $5.5 billion to make unnecessary payments,” Rolando wrote. “The result: instead of devising a coherent vision for the future, management has been reduced to counter-productive proposals to degrade services, which would only drive away customers.”
In the Portland demonstrations, protesters carried banners that said, “Occupy the Post Office” and “No Closures! No Cuts!”
In April, the Occupy Winston-Salem group demonstrated outside an area post office, saying that closing the only postal branch in the area would have negative consequences on the town.
“If that post office is closed, it will impact the daily life of all those residents living in that area,” said protester Amanda Porter-Cox. “Since it is located in a poorer part of town, it is particularly vulnerable. The other implication that will come up is that the 1% is taking over public services, making them private and taking rights away. We cannot allow this to happen.”