Oakwood, Oklahoma is a tiny spot of parched prairie 100 miles north west of Oklahoma City. It is over twenty miles from the next nearest town that gets a name on google maps. Oakwood is tiny. The 2000 census listed 70 inhabitants (more people work on my floor in my office building) and a google camera shot of the main intersection looks less busy than my driveway. Oakwood doesn't have a gas station or a convenience store but it does have a United States Post Office. At least it does until the latest Post Office closings go into effect. And this then is the problem that the Post Office has had for years, which is that it has maintained a retail presence and route system in rural America that no sane profit making making business would ever have done. Now, with postal losses mounting, the Post Office is beginning to close tiny offices like Oakwood. This will have ramifications for our country and they need to be examined so that as citizens we can make an informed decisions a to whether we are willing to pay the price to keep post offices like Oakwood open or pay the price to close them.
The price of maintaining the smaller Post Offices in America is clear-the cost of closing them less so. Rural America has been declining and daily postal service to all parts of this country at the same low price is one of the factors that has kept rural areas from declining even more. No one believes that if the postal services leaves the 90% of the territory of this country where only 5% of the population lives that private delivery companies will continue to serve those areas or do so without steep surcharges for "rural service". I think one of the things that has made America so great is the diversity of land and people who live throughout our country and any decision that would further population consolidation needs to be examined carefully.
The price of maintaining the smaller Post Offices in America is clear-the cost of closing them less so. Rural America has been declining and daily postal service to all parts of this country at the same low price is one of the factors that has kept rural areas from declining even more. No one believes that if the postal services leaves the 90% of the territory of this country where only 5% of the population lives that private delivery companies will continue to serve those areas or do so without steep surcharges for "rural service". I think one of the things that has made America so great is the diversity of land and people who live throughout our country and any decision that would further population consolidation needs to be examined carefully.