For years, postal workers have fought our battles on the workroom floor, across grievance tables, at the bargaining table, and inside our Union halls. Those fights are still necessary, but the challenges facing the United States Postal Service now require us to go further. The fight to protect the public Postal Service must move beyond our membership and into the communities we serve. The public needs to understand that USPS financial problems, service reductions, post office closures, Vote-by-Mail attacks, and privatization concerns are not simply union issues. They are community issues.
APWU is already moving in that direction. The Protect Our Public Post Office campaign, including the July 28 nationwide Day of Action, brought together postal workers, retirees, labor allies, families, and community supporters to call on Congress to strengthen USPS rather than allow financial problems to result in service cuts or post office closures. That message matters because USPS is facing serious financial pressure. Postmaster General David Steiner warned that without congressional action to increase borrowing authority, USPS could face a cash crisis affecting its ability to pay employees and vendors. But financial problems cannot be allowed to become the excuse for shrinking the public-service mission, reducing access, or pushing USPS toward a private-sector model centered primarily on profitability.
That is why our communities need to be involved. USPS has a universal service obligation that private delivery companies do not. Postal workers serve every ZIP Code, including communities and routes that may never be profitable in a private business model. When a neighborhood post office closes, when service standards change, or when access is reduced, the effect reaches far beyond postal employees. Small businesses, seniors, veterans, rural residents, and families all depend on reliable postal service. These issues become real when residents begin asking what restructuring means for their post office, their mail, and their community.
Vote-by-Mail is another example of why this fight reaches beyond our membership. APWU has been working to defend and expand voting by mail while emphasizing that postal workers are responsible for securely moving the mail entrusted to us. That directly affects voters and the public. The same is true with post office closures and privatization concerns. These are not abstract policy debates when a local community loses convenient postal access or sees services reduced.
National APWU can organize campaigns, lobby Congress, launch advertising efforts, hold livestreams, and provide locals with resources, but National cannot reach every neighborhood by itself. That responsibility eventually reaches us. Our members live in these communities. We have family, friends, neighbors, civic groups, veterans organizations, churches, and local organizations around us. Those connections give us the opportunity to explain why a strong public Postal Service matters.
But none of this works without participation from our own members. We cannot expect the public to stand with us if we are unwilling to stand with one another. Members need to attend General Membership Meetings, participate in rallies and Days of Action, share accurate information, contact elected officials, and talk with neighbors and community organizations about what is happening to USPS. Participation cannot begin only when your own job is affected. By then, decisions may already be made.
The future of USPS will not be decided only inside postal headquarters or Union halls. Congress, postal leadership, regulators, and the American public will all have a role. Our responsibility is to make sure the public understands what is at stake. We must take the facts beyond the workroom floor and into our communities.
The Postal Service belongs to the people. If we want the people standing with us to protect it, then we have to get out into our communities and give them a reason to stand with us.
