Images by Ty O’Neil
A crowd of about 40 to 50 people gathered outside the U.S. Post Office on Vassar Street today to show support for the Postal Service and its workers. It was one of a handful of rallies in northern Nevada, and one of thousands across the nation, organized to share a message of support for the beleaguered agency. The movement was dubbed “Save the Post Office Saturday.”
PLAN Action, short for Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada Action, was one of the organizers of the rally, joined by Indivisible Northern Nevada, Reno PDA and Move On.
“Every day we rely on the Postal Service to deliver important things, from our prescriptions and drivers licenses to a birthday gift for a loved one,” said Christine Saunders, Reno resident and PLAN Action political director. “This November, during a pandemic, we’re relying on the Postal Service to help us safely exercise democracy and vote. We are watching to make sure they have everything they need to do so.”
Similar rallies were hosted at the post offices in Sparks, south Reno, northwest Reno and Carson City. At the Vassar office, rally attendees mostly held signs of support for mail carriers and were met with honks of thanks from mail workers entering and leaving the facility.
At each rally organizers read a statement linking the Postal Service to Nevada’s history, of which the Pony Express trail and the Overland Mail and Stage Line are both a part.
“The point is, Nevadans have always relied on mail carriers in our vast state to connect us to each other, to the rest of the country, to the world,” the rally statement said.
Just hours after the Reno rally ended the U.S. House of Representatives passed legislation to send $25 billion to the U.S. Postal Service and prohibit operational changes to the agency prior to November’s election. According to a report in the Washington Post, “The Republican-led Senate has no plans to act on the legislation, which the White House has threatened to veto.”
