While news of the U.S. Postal Service cutting Saturday delivery met a shrug in some places, the reaction was different in many rural areas.
South Dakota Senator Tim Johnson and Representative Kristi Noem join a list of lawmakers pushing to keep Saturday mail service the same.
Bristol is a small town in Day County. Its post office recently cut back hours and now Saturday delivery will be gone. Some in the town say they don't mind; others say the change will impact them a lot.
"Well it's going to affect us quite a bit, just our business alone," Ralph Oakland said.
Hansmeier & Son, Inc is a seed company in Bristol and already has to adjust and find other ways to ship product after the post office in town went from being open eight hours in a day to four. Oakland says an end to Saturday delivery will affect it too.
And with fewer and fewer storefronts on Main Street, it can be scary when any business in a small town cuts back in one way or another. But not everyone's upset about it in rural America either.
"Well, I guess we have to accept it. We don't have anything else to do. They have to save money some way," Lorenda Towe said.
Towe says it won't bother her when Saturday mail delivery goes. And she's heard others in town saying the same. At the same time, she understands the Saturday mail can be important to others. So she isn't surprised to hear opposition coming from rural parts of the country.
"There's some that really live for that mail. And the delivery of our local newspaper will be disrupted," Towe said.
Despite opposing the Postal Service plan, Oakland understands the argument for it.
"I know the postal service has financial problems but cutting service and delivery is probably not the way to go," Oakland said.
And it won't be beneficial, he argues, for his small town or others either.
Oakland says the mail delay is noticeable when there's a Monday holiday. He says every week will feel the same when Saturday delivery is gone. But some others in the small town say the Postal Service could have cut Saturday mail delivery sooner.
Comments