Modesto, California, makes The Guardian this year....
for the travesty of what's happening to the U.S. Postal Service.
Of course, it's not just about Modesto, but that's Modesto's beautiful post office in the photo below.
SaveThePostOffice.com
On 9 June, the General Services Administration threw Modesto's downtown post office onto the auction block. Like so many other postal facilities, the Renaissance-style palazzo had long served as an anchor for downtown stores of the California town, a public space where citizens met to exchange news as well as transact business in an ennobling lobby of polished travertine and marble beneath murals of local farming activities.
The federal government once designed its post offices to elevate and inspire the public whose assets it is now selling. An architectural journal in 1918 spoke of the tutelary value of post offices:
"They are generally the most important of the local buildings, and taken together, [are] seen daily by thousands, who have little opportunity to feel the influence of the great architectural works in the large cities."
President Hoover's administration built facilities such as Modesto's in a last-ditch effort to end the Depression, before Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal unleashed a far greater torrent of public works that succeeded where Hoover had failed (pdf). In less than a decade, the Roosevelt administration built over 1,100 post offices, distinguished by fine architecture, materials and detailing, as well as by a lavish programme of public art that, for the first time, reflected back to patrons and workers their regional identity.
Mandated by the US constitution as a service vital to democracy, the post office has fallen victim to structural adjustment as well as to electronic communication. Congress has successively demanded that the US Postal Service run itself more like a business since making it a quasi-corporation in 1971. Required to provide universal service, even as the internet and private carriers cut into its profit centres, the USPS has spun into a death spiral, raising its rates as it slashes employment and service. It's now stripping its assets, as well.
The post office where I go to pick up mail in Hollywood, on Wilcox Avenue, is also beautiful. It's one of these grand old buildings and it's decorated with stamps twice as tall as human beings depicting old movie stars.
I used the USPS when I had an ebay business some years back (selling mosaic tiles which were cut from damaged vintage chintz and painted plates). They were fantastic. I do not recall them ever losing a package, as a matter of fact; and I used USPS to ship overseas, as well; mostly to Australia, Norway, Holland, and England. Their priority packages were the most frequent choice, and their tracking has always been good. And when I say they didn't lose a package, I mean it. There were a few---just a few--that got temporarily lost, and a few that came back---but they did not lose track of them.
This past week, I had the USPS lose track of a package, which hasn't happened in a long time (I still get things shipped via mail order and they've been consistent to this day). And when I went to the post office and stood in a line that stretched nearly out the door without moving, for 25 minutes, I realized: this is the start of the breakdown.
When the paid talkers say "Government is Bad and We Must Shrink It" ---this is what happens. When the paid talkers start talking profits and acting like government is a business--this is what happens. Government is not a business, nor is it meant to be run like a business. Business has profits first. The government, which is all we have standing between ourselves and lawlessness, has representation of taxpayers' interests and consumers' interest as its main objective.
These two objectives are not compatible.
That does not mean fiscal irresponsibility should reign; but at the USPS, that was not the case.
Their stamps are beautiful. They send letters anywhere in the country for under 50 cents. No one else does that.
I just ordered one of these "Keep Our Post Office Open" T shirts. Pretty good price.
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