South Dakota NewsMedia Association today endorsed legislation sponsored by Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) to improve mail delivery of newspapers and urged Congress to approve it quickly.
“The members of South Dakota NewsMedia Association are appreciative of Senator Rounds for sponsoring this important legislation,” SDNA Executive Director David Bordewyk said. “SDNA members view the U.S. Postal Service as a strategic partner in delivering their newspapers to readers. However, declining delivery and service coupled with double-digit rate increases over the last few years are unsustainable for our members. We need the Postal Service to succeed, and we fully support Senator Rounds in this legislation to help make that happen. Swift action by Congress would be meaningful in supporting local journalism."
Sen. Rounds and Sen. Peter Welch (D-Vt.) introduced the bipartisan “Deliver for Democracy Act” this week. The legislation would help South Dakota newspapers by rewarding the U.S. Postal Service for reliable postal delivery and limiting excessive rate increases.
In recent years, the Postal Service has dramatically raised mailing rates for newspapers under the guise of increased efficiency and improved service. However, newspapers have yet to see those benefits and instead continue to experience delays in mail delivery to their subscribers.
“Local journalists work hard every day to deliver news on a timely basis, and the U.S. Postal Service should too,” Rounds said in his press release announcing the legislation. “Periodical rates have cumulatively increased by over 40 percent since August 2021. Meanwhile, the Postal Service’s on-time delivery performances have not improved, leaving local journalists to pick up the slack by handling delivery on their own in order to make certain their readers receive their papers on time. Our common-sense bipartisan legislation helps protect rural newspapers and consumers from unjustified price hikes by making certain USPS is held to a standard for on-time deliveries.”
The Deliver for Democracy Act is also endorsed by the National Newspaper Association and the News/Media Alliance, representing newspapers nationwide.
The Deliver for Democracy Act would:
• Require the USPS to either achieve at least a 95% on-time delivery rate for Periodicals mail or an improvement of at least 2 percentage points to unlock its 2% surcharge authority for that class of mail;
• Direct the USPS to annually report to the Postal Regulatory Commission on its progress in including on-time delivery data for newspapers in its Periodical service performance measurement; and
• Instruct the Government Accountability Office to conduct a study and submit a report to Congress on options for alternate USPS pricing schemes to improve the financial position of Periodicals.
South Dakota NewsMedia Association, based in Brookings, represents the state’s newspapers and digital news outlets.
