The U.S. Postal Service has agreed to hold off on closing any more post offices or mail facilities until May 15, 2012, to allow Congress time to work on a plan to save the service.
The U.S. Postal Service agreed to voluntarily enact a moratorium on closures, after a series of talks with senators, lawmakers said. Sen. Richard Durbin said the postal service agreed to the deal, and he called it a challenge to Congress to “put up or shut up.”
The news of the moratorium comes just a week after the Postal Service announced a plan to slow down first-class mail, which would have closed some 250 mail processing plants nationwide and eliminated 28,000 jobs.
“If you don’t like what the postal service has put forward (to cut costs) by closing processing facilities and post offices and eliminating jobs, then come up with a better approach,” Durbin said. “It’s a challenge we need to accept, and this agreement with the postal service gives us that opportunity.”
The Postal Service issued a statement saying that they agreed to delay all closings and consolidations, but they’ll continue to review the facilities slated for possible closure during this period.
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