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Dead chicks, delayed prescriptions: Late mail leaves rural America disconnected

  

Category:  News & Politics

Via:  perrie-halpern  •  4 years ago  •  19 comments

By:   Phil McCausland

Dead chicks, delayed prescriptions: Late mail leaves rural America disconnected
Recent Postal Service delays have affected millions of Americans' packages and letters, but the impact has been particularly widespread and difficult in rural communities, which depend on the federal agency more than densely populated regions.

S E E D E D   C O N T E N T



When Jacob Gray opened the box of chicks he ordered, he saw that about 300 of them had been mashed to a pulp. The 100 or so birds that survived tread on their dead fellows and nibbled on what remained of them.

Gray, 28, has been ordering chicks from a breeder in California for his farm in rural southwest Colorado for more than seven years. He never lost more than about a dozen birds in a perforated box of 400 because the U.S. Postal Service delivered them within two days.

That changed over the past few months, as the boxes arrived days late to his home in Delta County, Colorado, an area larger than Rhode Island with a population of about 30,000 people.

Farmer Jacob Gray of Gray Acres in Paonia, Co.Courtesy Jacob Gray

"I opened it up and was immediately hit with the smell of death," he said of the most recent box he received two weeks ago. "Sometimes, the post office would call us in the morning and say, 'Get these things out of here,' because they smelled so bad."

Hundreds of baby birds Gray ordered this summer have died, and he said he had to cancel his remaining orders and renegotiate his farm loan because of nearly $4,000 in losses — more than 10 percent of what he'd hoped to earn this year.

Recent Postal Service delays have affected millions of Americans' packages and letters, but the impact has been particularly widespread and difficult in rural communities, which depend on the federal agency more than densely populated regions of the United States.

In addition to chicks and other small livestock, including honeybees, farmers order seeds and specialty tools they can no longer purchase locally. Meanwhile, hundreds of rural pharmacies have closed in recent years, leaving residents dependent on mailed prescriptions. In addition, millions of people living in remote areas lack broadband internet, so they rely on the Postal Service to pay bills, receive paychecks, conduct business and correspond with family and friends.

"As important as the Postal Service is to the rest of the country," said Arthur Sackler, manager of the Coalition for a 21st Century Postal Service, an independent group that advocates for the agency in Washington, D.C., "it's considerably more so to our far-flung rural areas."

The Postal Service came under intense scrutiny in recent weeks over the long wait times for letter and package deliveries. Many blamed recently appointed Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, a Republican donor and ally of President Donald Trump.

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Postmaster General DeJoy testifies at House hearing


In two tense Congressional hearings last month, Democrats accused DeJoy, a former logistics executive, of hamstringing the agency on Trump's behalf to undermine mail-in voting. DeJoy and the president have both rejected the characterization that they were holding up the mail for political reasons, with the postmaster general largely blaming the pandemic for the widespread delay of deliveries.

"The U.S. Postal Service, like other delivery companies, has experienced some temporary service disruptions in a few locations domestically, due to the COVID-19 pandemic," Postal Service spokeswoman Kim Frum said in an email. "Things are slowly getting back to normal, however until we reach pre-COVID conditions, we continue to leverage our available resources to match the increased workload, including hiring based on local needs."

While the Postal Service's performance is beginning to tick back upward, after timely deliveries fell more than 10 percent beginning in July, according to the agency's numbers, people living in rural communities say they're still seeing the fallout of the delays. The Postal Service reported last week that its "last mile" delivery network — or mail that is carried to underserved rural communities — remained down 4.26 percent from its baseline.

Gray expanded his farm earlier this year, putting up new buildings and planning to begin selling his pasture-raised chickens to restaurant distributors in Denver. But the delays have put his business in jeopardy. He hoped to earn more than $30,000 this year, but the losses have eaten into more than 10 percent of his income, as even the birds that survive the delays have become sick and died before he can process and sell them.

"It's delaying things," he said. "We're not maybe going to lose the farm, but it hurts."

Gray Acres farm in Paonia, Co.Courtesy Jacob Gray

Rob Larew, the president of the National Farmers Union, a group that represents thousands of farmers across 33 states, said many of his members have complained about continued delays harming their businesses. And the effect goes beyond farmers, he said, since the Postal Service is a critical lifeline for rural communities nationwide.

"Out here, it just isn't that simple," he said from his farm in rural West Virginia. "Everything already takes additional time, and so that adds cost. Even if it's not delivery cost, it's the cost of time. If you start to remove those last key delivery options, you put rural communities in a complete bind."

The Federal Communications Commission estimated this year that 14.5 million Amercians in rural areas don't have access to broadband internet in an increasingly digital world. Larew pointed out that the Postal Service helps connect people who don't have the internet at their fingertips.

Critics say the cause of the Postal Service delays is DeJoy's insistence that mail trucks run on time, which he admitted before Congress that he did without adjusting mail processing. That meant mail trucks were leaving processing facilities close to empty, with mail and packages left behind, mail carriers have previously told NBC News. And that led to a backlog of deliveries at many post offices.

DeJoy's detractors have also raised concerns about the Postal Service's decision to remove letter-sorting machines and blue collection boxes, which appeared to coincide with Trump's disparagement of mail-in voting and the Postal Service's warning to dozens of states that they may not be able to handle the millions of mailed ballots expected this year.

After facing public pressure, DeJoy said he would suspend — though not reverse — all policy or operational changes until after the presidential election.

Postal workers, meanwhile, emphasized that DeJoy had cut back on overtime and extra trips that carriers took to ensure the swift delivery of mail. DeJoy stated in congressional testimony that overtime rates had remained the same. Extra trips, though, have dropped: Postal Service data shows that they fell from close to 150,000 at the end of June to fewer than 5,000 at the end of August.

Sackler, of the Coalition for a 21st Century Postal Service, said many of these decisions — particularly the removal of the mail-sorting machines and blue boxes — preceded DeJoy, but the postmaster general and the agency pursued them with a lack of transparency, causing confusion.

"There was no real consultation of any kind with postal stakeholders, with unions, with customers, with Congress about how [DeJoy] was going to be doing this, and predictably service dropped," he said.

The drop in service, meanwhile, has many looking toward November. While many states expect to see a rise in mail-in ballots this year amid coronavirus concerns, rural residents are particularly reliant on the Postal Service for voting access.

Larew said the Farmers Union noticed that polling locations in rural places, once run by older people who sign up to be poll workers, have a deficit of volunteers this year. Local governments, including in Larew's native West Virginia, have begun to consolidate polling locations in response, which means rural Americans will have to drive farther to cast their ballots.

Other states are seeing similar issues. Louisiana Secretary of State Kyle Ardoin announced a recruitment campaign this week because of a shortage of volunteers. Texas consolidated nearly a dozen polling locations in its most rural counties before July's election because of a lack of poll workers.

The Election Assistance Commission said that more than half of the 900,000 poll workers who served in 2016 were over the age of 60, meaning that the majority of those poll workers would be considered at high-risk during the pandemic. That has many election officials concerned they could see a major shortfall come November.

"Mail-in ballots are the only safe and reasonable alternative to that," Larew said. "Limiting the access or reliability of that marginalizes these rural residents."

The delays have also taken a toll on mailed prescription drugs.

With a growing number of insurance companies forcing or incentivizing Americans to receive their prescription drugs by mail, rather than from a brick-and-mortar pharmacy, the number of mailed medications has grown in recent years and even more so amid the pandemic.

The Postal Service managed 1.2 billion prescription drug shipments last year — or about 4 million each day, six days a week — the National Association of Letter Carriers reported. Rural residents in particular depend on mailed medications, as 1,231 independently owned rural pharmacies, or approximately 16 percent, closed between 2003 and 2018, according to the RUPRI Center for Rural Health Policy Analysis.

"For these isolated and marginalized rural communities, and for the farmers and ranchers in them, the Postal Service has been a great equalizer and essential service that has helped them at least be able to tap into some of what everyone else has," Larew said. "For people out here, the Postal Service is absolutely a lifeline."


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Bob Nelson
Professor Guide
1  Bob Nelson    4 years ago

Castrating the Post Office screws rural America. 

This is strictly in keeping with ALL of Trump's social policies. "Screw those stupid farmers!" 

... and the farmers adore him... 

 
 
 
Kavika
Professor Principal
2  Kavika     4 years ago

The USPS is a service for Americans and not a business.

DeJoy is simply another tool for the administration.

 
 
 
zuksam
Junior Silent
2.1  zuksam  replied to  Kavika @2    4 years ago

It's a service that's supposed to be funded by the people who use that service. The more you use it the more you pay. Trump didn't cause the USPS's problems this has been going on for decades. I think they could solve all of their money problems by only delivering to each address three times a week. I can't remember ever getting anything by snail mail that I couldn't have waited for one more day and if it were that important why would I wait five days when overnight delivery is available. They could divide the routes and half would be delivered on Mon. Wed, Fri and the other half on Tues, Thurs, Sat. and businesses or anyone else who wants 6 day pickup and delivery can pay a monthly fee for the extra service. If they did that they'd have no more money problems since that last leg of mail delivery between the post office and the destination address probably accounts for over 80% of their fuel, vehicle, and labor costs. Most of the letters nonbusiness people send are to very high volume destinations when paying bills but even those are diminishing, I pay things with my credit card unless there's a fee then I mail a check and I will never do auto pay. Most of the mail nonbusiness people receive comes from high volume mailers, Bills, junk mail, weekly sales fliers. As far as package delivery goes certain levels would still be delivered everyday but the cheapest level would only be delivered on your standard scheduled days.

 
 
 
Kavika
Professor Principal
2.1.1  Kavika   replied to  zuksam @2.1    4 years ago

The cutting of mail delivery (Saturday) has been suggested by the prior Postmaster and turned down by congress by some of the same congressmen that are supporting its demise. 

There are many that depend on the mail for checks, medicine etc. 

I lived in a very rural area and the PO was a critical part of the small community. 

A service is a service and not intended to be a moneymaker. By using that as a debate tool I suspect you'd have to include other government entities as well. How about the Social Security Administration, the Department of Education, FTC, FDA, etc etc. 

 

 
 
 
zuksam
Junior Silent
2.1.2  zuksam  replied to  Kavika @2.1.1    4 years ago

Every year mail volume gets lower while costs increase and the USPS needs more subsidies to operate. If people are unwilling to compromise on service then the mailing rates need to be raised to cover the full cost. USPS subsidies are mostly subsidizing Big Businesses that mail large volumes for less than cost. You act like every service you receive from the government is a constitutional right, well it's not. There are many government services I used to get that are no longer provided. I like the USPS and would like to save it but it was designed from the start to be self funded and it needs to get back on track, it doesn't need to turn a profit but it does need to cover costs. Getting rid of Saturday wouldn't be enough long term because mail volume will continue to go down. Three days a week would be fine and keep the USPS in the black for the next hundred years and people who rely on the mail would still get their mail. Rural delivery has always been subsidized by urban delivery and that wouldn't change a bit. The only limit I'd put on very rural addresses is six day a week delivery for a fee might not be available everywhere mostly because for 99% of the US the fee could be kept very low like 20 bucks a month because businesses would be the biggest subscribers and they tend to get higher volumes of mail which makes it more economical and allows their fees to subsidize lower volume subscribers who just pay the fee because they want what they want. 20 bucks a month isn't going to come close to covering a ten mile round trip 13 times a month to one address so it would be foolish not to have some limits but people who live in places like that are used to planning ahead it's a big part of their lifestyle and they already expect extended delivery times as it is. One extra day isn't going to kill anyone.

 
 
 
Kavika
Professor Principal
2.1.3  Kavika   replied to  zuksam @2.1.2    4 years ago
If people are unwilling to compromise on service then the mailing rates need to be raised to cover the full cost.

Did you miss where it was congress that wouldn't allow a reduction in the number of days for mail delivery????

You act like every service you receive from the government is a constitutional right, well it's not.

Please point out where I said that every service is a constitutional right. You act and sound like you don't understand that its congress that won't let them change their delivery schedule. 

  • But along with requiring the Postal Service to break even, Congress has restricted the Service's ability to raise rates, enter new lines of business or take other steps to help it raise revenue. In fact, while detractors complain that the Postal Service is antiquated, inefficient and burdened by bureaucracy, the rules blocking the Postal Service from entering new lines of business do so   because the Postal Service would have advantages over private companies. For example, Republicans in Congress forced the Postal Service to remove public-use copiers from Post Offices and   even blocked the Postal Service   from setting up a secure online system that allowed Americans to make monthly bill payments.
 
 
 
Ender
Professor Principal
2.1.4  Ender  replied to  Kavika @2.1.3    4 years ago

Seems like that's the goal of some people. Make it unworkable then privatize.

 
 
 
Kavika
Professor Principal
2.1.5  Kavika   replied to  Ender @2.1.4    4 years ago
Seems like that's the goal of some people. Make it unworkable then privatize.

Exactly.

 
 
 
Bob Nelson
Professor Guide
2.1.6  Bob Nelson  replied to  zuksam @2.1.2    4 years ago
it was designed from the start to be self funded

Really? 

I see no evidence for that assertion. Postal service is mandated in the Constitution, but there's nothing about how it should operate. 

 
 
 
Paula Bartholomew
Professor Participates
2.2  Paula Bartholomew  replied to  Kavika @2    4 years ago

Actually, the USPS is the only government run business we have.

 
 
 
Split Personality
Professor Guide
2.2.2  Split Personality  replied to    4 years ago

That would require a Constitutional Amendment.

Very unlikely.

 
 
 
Paula Bartholomew
Professor Participates
3  Paula Bartholomew    4 years ago

DeJoy should be brought up on charges of animal cruelty.

 
 
 
devangelical
Professor Principal
4  devangelical    4 years ago

I really don't care if a trumpski puppet fucks over his dipshit rural base.

 
 
 
Ender
Professor Principal
4.1  Ender  replied to  devangelical @4    4 years ago

Idiots would cheer then blame the wrong people.

 
 
 
JBB
Professor Principal
5  JBB    4 years ago

The flat rates that the US Postal Service charges to deliver out to the ends of couny dirt roads and into swamps and the darkest woods is and always has been a big subsidized benefit to rural Americans. 

It's that simple. Either you want it to continue or not!

 
 
 
zuksam
Junior Silent
6  zuksam    4 years ago

(deleted)

 
 
 
Jeremy Retired in NC
Professor Expert
7  Jeremy Retired in NC    4 years ago
Recent Postal Service delays have affected millions of Americans' packages and letters

This had been going on for decades.  But for some reason it's a "real" problem now.

 
 

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