State AFL-CIO  Federations to Staples: Postal Workers and Customers Deserve Better

State AFL-CIO Federations to Staples: Postal Workers and Customers Deserve Better

APWU Web News: Local union leaders are winning allies for the union’s campaign against a pilot program that placed postal retail centers in more than 80 Staples stores, reports Northeast Region Coordinator John Dirzius. Jim Bertolone, President of the Rochester Area Local, and Mike Dennehy, Vice President of the Greater ... Read More
Alternatives to the Post Office: Expanded Access in FY 2013

Alternatives to the Post Office: Expanded Access in FY 2013

The APWU is currently sending delegations to Staples stores in their communities to meet with store managers to protest the postal counters that have been installed at 82 stores, with plans for more.  After the visits, the APWU plans to organize a day of action at Staples stores around the ... Read More
Union, Activists and Officials Fight Sale of Landmark Bronx Post Office

Union, Activists and Officials Fight Sale of Landmark Bronx Post Office

DNAInfo: "Bronx officials, activists and union representatives are calling on the United States Postal Service to immediately halt its sale of the Bronx General Post Office – a plan they have contested in the past. "The 170,000-square-foot building on East 149th Street and the Grand Concourse, filled with murals from ... Read More
Congressional vote blocks Berkeley post office sale

Congressional vote blocks Berkeley post office sale

Berkeley's hopes of keeping its century-old post office off the auction block have gotten a boost in Congress, where a bipartisan House bill urges the Postal Service to refrain from selling historic buildings, including Berkeley's, while the U.S. inspector general investigates whether the agency is violating preservation laws. Read more ... Read More
Impassioned crowd protests sale of historic post office in Topeka KS

Impassioned crowd protests sale of historic post office in Topeka KS

Topeka Capital Journal: Dozens of people delivered impassioned pleas or registered concerns and questions Tuesday afternoon to the U.S. Postal Service regarding its intentions to vacate and sell its historic downtown building and lease a smaller space as a cost-saving maneuver. An open forum was held at 4 p.m. in ... Read More
Film producer buys historic Santa Monica post office

Film producer buys historic Santa Monica post office

Looks like historic post offices are becoming a fashionable trophy for Hollywood film producers. First Joel Silver (Mad Max, The Matrix) bought the Venice post office. Now SkyDance Productions (True Grit, World War Z) has bought the Santa Monica post office, which was closed back in June. Read more ... Read More
Representatives Serrano and Lee: Postal Service Must Halt Historic Buildings Sales

Representatives Serrano and Lee: Postal Service Must Halt Historic Buildings Sales

Press release: Washington, DC – Congressman Jose Serrano and Congresswoman Barbara Lee have both called for a halt to the sale of post offices. They have each issued press releases today explaining that multiple provisions included in the omnibus appropriations bill unveiled on Monday urged the U.S. Postal Service to ... Read More
New York Metro Area Postal Union calls for an immediate moratorium on the sale of the historic Bronx GPO

New York Metro Area Postal Union calls for an immediate moratorium on the sale of the historic Bronx GPO

New York Metro Area Postal Union Press Release: New York, NY – January 14, 2014 – When President Jonathan Smith of the New York Metro Area Postal Union learned that the United States Postal Service was going ahead with its plans to sell the historic Bronx GPO, he wanted to ... Read More
Postal Service proposes changing environmental regulations on post office disposals

Postal Service proposes changing environmental regulations on post office disposals

The Postal Service has proposed a revision of federal regulations that would help it avoid going through an extensive environmental review process when disposing of postal properties like post offices. The Postal Service wants to make things easier because it has many more sales planned for the future. As the ... Read More
Belleview MO post office closes over lease issue

Belleview MO post office closes over lease issue

The post office in Belleview, Missouri, in the Arcadia Valley, closed on December 30. It was supposed to stay open as part of POStPlan for four hours a day, but the Postal Service says that the landlord wouldn't renew the lease. There's probably more to it than that, but the ... Read More
Sale of historic Bronx Post Office moves forward; bids due Jan. 15

Sale of historic Bronx Post Office moves forward; bids due Jan. 15

The Postal Service is moving forward on the sale of the historic Bronx General Post Office at 558 Grand Concourse in New York City. The property is listed on the USPS-CBRE Properties for Sale website, where a new Call-for-Offers announcement says interested parties should submit their bids by 5:00 p.m ... Read More
Delivery after dark: Postal Service presents data showing big increase in carriers out after 5:00

Delivery after dark: Postal Service presents data showing big increase in carriers out after 5:00

Yesterday the Postal Service published data showing what letter carriers have been complaining about for a long time: More and more of them are out on the street after dark. Since 2005, the percentage of carriers out after 5:00 p.m. has gone from less than 20 percent to over 40 ... Read More
New England Views: At rural post offices, a steady erosion of service

New England Views: At rural post offices, a steady erosion of service

Concord Monitor: Many small-town post offices have suspected that their hours, if not days, are numbered. While the U.S. Postal Service in 2012 called off drastic plans to close many rural post offices, it has been proceeding apace with other budget-cutting measures, including curtailing counter service at post offices throughout ... Read More
Rally in Houston to protest relocation of historic post office

Rally in Houston to protest relocation of historic post office

Several dozen protesters rallied on Thursday afternoon to express their objections to the Postal Service's plans to close the Southmore Station in Houston, the historic site of the city's first civil rights sit-in demonstration in 1960. Activist Robert Muhammad told protesters, “It’s no reason why you couldn’t have 2,000 people ... Read More
Postal Workers Deliver Protest Letters to Staples in NYC

Postal Workers Deliver Protest Letters to Staples in NYC

Postal workers with the NY Metro Area Postal Union sent delegations to three Staples stores on January 8 and 9 to deliver letters protesting the establishment of postal retail units staffed by low-wage, non-union, non-postal workers. The national action is set for January 18, but New York union members weren't ... Read More
Historic Topeka KS post office headed for sale

Historic Topeka KS post office headed for sale

The Postal Service announced a proposal to vacate the historic Topeka, Kansas, post office and move operations to a yet-to-be determined site. A 30-minute community meeting designed to gain input from the community has been scheduled for 4 to 4:30 p.m. Tuesday in the main post office auditorium. That is ... Read More
Postal workers to hold rally against delivery in the dark

Postal workers to hold rally against delivery in the dark

On Monday, January 20, Martin Luther King Day, postal workers will hold a rally and march in Washington DC to protest delivery in the dark. Read more ... Read More
Sonora CA post office studied for closure

Sonora CA post office studied for closure

The Postal Service is doing a discontinuance study on the downtown post office in Sonora, California. It's just a small retail outlet (1,400 square feet) in a leased space where the rent is about $2,000 a month. It's been there since 1982, but the lease expired at the end of ... Read More
Staplizing the Post Office: A dozen reasons to just say no

Staplizing the Post Office: A dozen reasons to just say no

Back in November, the Postal Service quietly announced that it was setting up postal counters in a couple of Staples stores in San Jose and South San Francisco.  The website Going Postal broke the Staples story a few days later with its report about a pilot program that included 82 Staples stores in areas around ... Read More
The corporatization of the Postal Service: Post office closures, suspensions, relocations, and reductions in 2013

The corporatization of the Postal Service: Post office closures, suspensions, relocations, and reductions in 2013

One of the most persistent refrains in the debate about the Postal Service is that it needs to act more like a business. That means different things to different people, but for many, the model for where the Postal Service needs to go is to be found in Europe. In ... Read More