Do you know who Modesto’s postmaster is? I bet you don’t. Not even the mayor does
Senate passage Tuesday of the Postal Service Reform Act came as good news for two big reasons: It should save the iconic institution that brings us mail and packages despite snow, rain, heat and gloom of night. And it showed that Democrats and Republicans really can agree on something these days.
Still, I wonder whether the bipartisan law (it passed both houses in Congress with overwhelming support and should be signed soon by President Biden) will have any direct impact on our lives here in Modesto, Stanislaus County and neighboring parts. An online delivery tracking service, when they develop it, seems the most visible improvement on the horizon; changing retirement benefits and employee health care aren’t things we’ll actually see.
Speaking of post office things we see, and don’t — when did you last talk with your postmaster?
Do you know who she or he is?
I used to, back in the day, when postmasters often were important local public figures, threads in Americana fabric.
Dennis Thompson was my postmaster in Salida more years than I can remember, and he served on the local school board for 25 years. He always was good for a quote if needed.
When I wrote in 1998 about changes in downtown Modesto as the long-vacant Hughson and Covell hotels were razed to make way for Tenth Street Place, then-Postmaster Michael Austin was happy to chat. In 2003, Modesto Postmaster Don Reddig explained procedure for a story about Scott Peterson applying for a private mailbox before his pregnant wife, Laci, was murdered. And until she left a couple of years ago, former Modesto Postmaster Jennifer Gowans was easy to find, too.
But I’ll be honest — I don’t know the postmaster today. And I bet you don’t, either.
“No idea,” Modesto Mayor Sue Zwahlen said recently, a searching look on her face. Her father was a career postal service employee, and she knows all the key players in town, so you might think she would be acquainted with the postmaster. In the same private meeting, City Manager Joe Lopez also had no clue.
It’s not their fault. Trying to learn the Modesto postmaster’s identity turned out to be something of a Where’s Waldo experience.
Go ahead — Google it. All my searches turned up nothing, or wrong names.
A fading art in Modesto
I disturbed Gowans’ retirement with a phone call. Had there been a policy change somewhere along the line moving postmasters away from prominent roles?
“No. They always wanted us out in the community,” she said. “They told us to talk to customers, to get business.”
She pointed me to webpmt.usps.gov, the postal service’s online postmaster finder. It says Salvatore Cardinal has been Modesto’s postmaster since Gowans retired in March 2020, but Gowans and a neighbor who has a friend working at the post office both assured me it’s not really him. And his name doesn’t show up in The Modesto Bee’s archive.
I inquired with the postal service’s media contact for this area, asking to speak to the Modesto postmaster. She said in an email, “the current postmaster is currently on a temporary assignment managing a large number of offices in the region and is not available.”
I mentioned the trouble I’d had tracking down his name and asked if the postal service for some reason doesn’t want postmasters to be as involved in public life as they once were. No response.
If the postmaster still shows up to barbecues at your local fire station, or hangs out at Rotary, or appears at neighborhood school career days, you’re lucky. Such involvement in community seems to be a fading art, a rarity akin to having a pen pal or crafting a thoughtful note in longhand to seal in a paper envelope adorned with a licked stamp.
Cut postmasters some slack
Sandra McDowell, 80, was that kind of postmaster for 19 years in Patterson, serving with Soroptimists and on the boards of the Haven women’s shelter and a Patterson mental health clinic — before and after retiring years ago. She can’t count the times she listened to customers’ struggles with a patient smile.
“A lot of times when people came in to complain, I would find out that it wasn’t about the postal service at all — they were just (upset) over a lot of things,” McDowell recalled. “Most people want to be heard, they don’t want to be fixed. I always thought when I retired I would go back to college and become a psychologist. I said, what the devil are you thinking, lady? That’s what you’ve been doing for 30 years!”
Then she offered me advice: Don’t be too harsh, if you think postmasters aren’t as accessible these days. How easy can it be to steer a venerable, essential service that’s been criticized and politicized to a pulp? Like private companies, the postal service is struggling like crazy to retain employees — and still manages to keep us informed and connected, as it has for more than two centuries.
Like newspapers.
Now that, I understand.
