Please ensure Javascript is enabled for purposes of website accessibility
Thousands of Chicks Dead on Arrival After Post Office Cuts
gvw_ap_news
By Associated Press
Published 4 years ago on
August 20, 2020

Share

PORTLAND, Maine — At least 4,800 chicks shipped to Maine farmers through the U.S. Postal Service have arrived dead in recent weeks after rapid cuts hit the federal mail carrier’s operations, U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree said.

Thousands of birds that moved through the Postal Service’s processing center in Shrewsbury, Massachusetts, were also dead, impacting several farms in Maine and New Hampshire, Henderson said.

Pingree, a Maine Democrat, is raising the issue of the dead chicks and the losses farms are facing in a letter to Postmaster General Louis DeJoy and U.S. Department of Agriculture Commissioner Sonny Perdue, The Portland Press Herald reported.

Pauline Henderson, who owns Pine Tree Poultry in New Sharon, Maine, told the newspaper she was shocked last week when all of the 800 chicks sent to her from a hatchery in Pennsylvania were dead.

“Usually they arrive every three weeks like clockwork,” she said. “And out of 100 birds you may have one or two that die in shipping.”

Thousands of birds that moved through the Postal Service’s processing center in Shrewsbury, Massachusetts, were also dead, impacting several farms in Maine and New Hampshire, Henderson said.

Steve Doherty, a spokesman for the USPS, said the agency “can’t locate a claim being filed for this loss.” Some animals, including live chicks, can be mailed safely under proper conditions.

“It’s one more of the consequences of this disorganization, this sort of chaos they’ve created at the post office and nobody thought through when they were thinking of slowing down the mail,” Pingree said, adding that her office has received dozens of complaints from farmers and others trying to raise a small flock of chickens in the backyard.

Pingree said she isn’t sure if Perdue is aware of how the changes in the Postal Service are impacting smaller poultry farmers in the U.S.

The Postal Service Is the Only Entity That Ships Live Chicks and Other Small Animals

“This is a system that’s always worked before and it’s worked very well until these changes started being made,” Pingree said.

DeJoy, a Republican donor who’s the first postmaster general who did not come from the ranks of the Postal Service, took control of the agency in June and has since swiftly engineered cuts and operational changes that are disrupting mail delivery operations. In Maine, two mail-sorting machines were dismantled at the state’s postal distribution hub.

He announced Tuesday he would halt some changes to mail delivery that critics blamed for widespread delays and warned could disrupt the November election, which is expected to bring a surge of mail-in ballots because of the coronavirus pandemic.

DeJoy is scheduled to testify before the Senate on Friday.

President Donald Trump made clear last week that he was blocking $25 billion in emergency aid to the Postal Service, acknowledging he wanted to curtail election mail operations, as well as a Democratic proposal to provide $3.6 billion in additional election money to the states to help process mail-in ballots.

Those funds are tangled in a broader coronavirus aid package that was approved in the House but stalled in the Senate.

The Postal Service is the only entity that ships live chicks and other small animals and has done so since 1918, according to the service’s website.

“Rural Americans, including agricultural producers, disproportionately rely on USPS for their livelihoods, and it is essential that they receive reliable service,” Pingree said.

DON'T MISS

Boeing’s Financial Woes Continue, While Families of Crash Victims Urge US to Prosecute

DON'T MISS

Police Tangle With Students in Texas and California as Wave of Campus Protest Against Gaza War Grows

DON'T MISS

Meet the Valley Republican Predicting a November Win Over Esmeralda Soria

DON'T MISS

Wired Wednesday: Construction Workers on 2018 Fresno Unified Project Still Not Paid

DON'T MISS

Slumping California Risks Losing World’s ‘5th Largest Economy’ Title

DON'T MISS

Ukraine Uses Long-Range Missiles Secretly Provided by US to Hit Russian-Held Areas, Officials Say

DON'T MISS

Upward Bound: Edison High’s Garcia Headed to Johns Hopkins

DON'T MISS

Boxing Star Ryan Garcia Wants to Meet Netanyahu, Pledges Aid for Gaza Children

DON'T MISS

Fong Won’t Debate Boudreaux, but We Get Hot Topic Answers Anyway

DON'T MISS

Legislation Pandering to Tribal Casinos Is a Bad Bet for Fresno Cardroom Employees

UP NEXT

Ancestry Website to Catalogue Names of Japanese Americans Incarcerated During World War II

UP NEXT

Google Fires More Workers Who Protested Its Deal With Israel

UP NEXT

What Do Supreme Court Justices Say About Homelessness?

UP NEXT

Oprah Winfrey and Dwayne Johnson Pledged $10M for Maui Wildfire Survivors. They Gave Much More.

UP NEXT

15 People Injured When Tram Collides With Guardrail at Universal Studios Theme Park

UP NEXT

The Pickle Flavor Frenzy and Its Rise in Food Trends

UP NEXT

Long-Lost First Model of USS Enterprise from ‘Star Trek’ Boldly Goes Home

UP NEXT

Man Sets Himself on Fire Outside Trump Hush Money Trial Court

UP NEXT

Rare House Vote Sees Ukraine, Israel Aid Advance as Democrats Join Republicans

UP NEXT

Full Jury and 6 Alternates Seated in Trump’s Hush Money Trial

Wired Wednesday: Construction Workers on 2018 Fresno Unified Project Still Not Paid

12 hours ago

Slumping California Risks Losing World’s ‘5th Largest Economy’ Title

12 hours ago

Ukraine Uses Long-Range Missiles Secretly Provided by US to Hit Russian-Held Areas, Officials Say

14 hours ago

Upward Bound: Edison High’s Garcia Headed to Johns Hopkins

Local Education /

15 hours ago

Boxing Star Ryan Garcia Wants to Meet Netanyahu, Pledges Aid for Gaza Children

15 hours ago

Fong Won’t Debate Boudreaux, but We Get Hot Topic Answers Anyway

16 hours ago

Legislation Pandering to Tribal Casinos Is a Bad Bet for Fresno Cardroom Employees

16 hours ago

About 1 in 4 US Adults Over 50 Say They Expect to Never Retire, an AARP Study Finds

17 hours ago

Biden Signs a $95 Billion War Aid Measure With Assistance for Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan

17 hours ago

Ancestry Website to Catalogue Names of Japanese Americans Incarcerated During World War II

18 hours ago

Boeing’s Financial Woes Continue, While Families of Crash Victims Urge US to Prosecute

Boeing said Wednesday that it lost $355 million on falling revenue in the first quarter, another sign of the crisis gripping the aircraft ma...

11 hours ago

11 hours ago

Boeing’s Financial Woes Continue, While Families of Crash Victims Urge US to Prosecute

11 hours ago

Police Tangle With Students in Texas and California as Wave of Campus Protest Against Gaza War Grows

CA District 27 Assembly candidate Joanna Garcia Rose
11 hours ago

Meet the Valley Republican Predicting a November Win Over Esmeralda Soria

12 hours ago

Wired Wednesday: Construction Workers on 2018 Fresno Unified Project Still Not Paid

12 hours ago

Slumping California Risks Losing World’s ‘5th Largest Economy’ Title

14 hours ago

Ukraine Uses Long-Range Missiles Secretly Provided by US to Hit Russian-Held Areas, Officials Say

Local Education /
15 hours ago

Upward Bound: Edison High’s Garcia Headed to Johns Hopkins

15 hours ago

Boxing Star Ryan Garcia Wants to Meet Netanyahu, Pledges Aid for Gaza Children

MENU

CONNECT WITH US

Search

Send this to a friend