[Advisors] [CommunityInformaticsCanada] FW: Delivering Community Power: A bold vision for an expanded postal service

[Michael Gurstein]

Thanks for this Russell,

 

Your comments are on target.  However, I think an express objective of this initiative and why they are looking for a new mandate/extended set of activities for the Post Office is that they would like to see it re-nationalized.  This is based on among other things the experiences you are pointing to below as well as the quite cavalier behaviour of the current President.

 

M

 

From: cracin-canada-owner at vancouvercommunity.net [mailto:cracin-canada-owner at vancouvercommunity.net] On Behalf Of Russell McOrmond
Sent: March 9, 2016 6:17 AM
To: cracin-canada <cracin-canada at vcn.bc.ca>
Cc: TC Advisors <advisors at tc.ca>
Subject: Re: [CommunityInformaticsCanada] FW: Delivering Community Power: A bold vision for an expanded postal service

 

 

On Mon, Feb 29, 2016 at 12:01 PM, Michael Gurstein <gurstein at gmail.com <mailto:gurstein at gmail.com> > wrote:

Interesting proposal. Perhaps they should add community broadband/community wireless to the range of offerings.

 

M

 

 

  This would be an unfortunate move.  For a number of reasons I don't think Canada Post has acted very community minded, and has failed in technology roll-outs even of technologies that are primary to their business.

 

Two examples:

 

1) We have been fighting for decades to get postal code data released from Canada Post.  While they consider this to be proprietary data, it is data that should be considered public in nature and made open access.  Given Canada Post has been fighting this, it has been justifiably suggested that this activity be removed from Canada Post and handled by an accountable government agency.  The idea of putting more public services in the hands of this proprietary minded organization suggests increased failures.

 

2) The roll-out of the new community mailboxes has been a failure.  I grew up with a community box which was a sturdy metal system with separate locks that could be individually purchased, as well as purchased from Canada Post.  These were outdoor locks, intended to be used in robust weather conditions like we see in Canada.   The new boxes use indoor locks, which means that it is impossible to pick up your mail during large parts of winter.  Fortunately winter has been mild this year and there were fewer days of being frozen out of mail, but this is not something we should have to rely on.   It is like some unaccountable bureaucrat at Canada Post forgot the Canada part of their name.

 

 

 

  These are just two examples that come to mind.  If it were possible as a citizen/consumer to not use the services of Canada Post I would have done so already.  Unfortunately the government imposes this organization on us, so we just have to put up with their failures.

 

 

  Please don't join calls or offer community support to add additional services to an organization that hasn't had a good track record, and will be more likely to fail than succeed at new services.

 

-- 

Russell McOrmond, Internet Consultant: <http://www.flora.ca/>

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