Union protests plan to cut mail deliveries

DETROIT, Aug. 25 (UPI) -- Union postal workers in Detroit said a plan to cut out Saturday deliveries was the wrong way for the U.S. Postal Service to save money.

With a national postal service convention in town, thousands of union workers marched to protest the measure the postal service says will save $3 billion, The Detroit News reported Wednesday.

The Rev. Jesse Jackson, who joined in the protest, said, "We are marching for jobs. We intend to bring America back, and we want our mail delivered every day."

Mark Gaffney, president of the AFL-CIO, echoed the sentiment. "We're going to win this fight because everyone who has a mailbox agrees with us," he said.

Union members chanted "Five days, no way," as they marched to Campus Martius, a downtown park.

Michael Arrabito, a member of the American Postal Workers Union, said, "When the U.S. Postal Service was established by Congress in 1792, it didn't say anything about making a profit."

But the Postal Service said it is losing billions of dollars as the Internet sweeps business away.

That leaves some caught between a rock and a hard place. "Don't they know that not everybody has access to the Internet?" said Darlene Rivers, a Detroit resident, referring to the Postal Service and, potentially, Congress, which must approve the proposal.