Halting the demise of small-town vitality

Earlier this month, the federal government announced it will maintain its moratorium on rural post office closures. It also introduced an obligation to inform and consult with people at least one month prior to closing, moving or amalgamating their public post office or changing their method of delivery.
A moratorium has existed since 1994 that protects approximately 3,800 public post offices in rural and small, single-post-office towns.
Canada Post says it will maintain the 1994 moratorium on post office closures as per the charter, but the actual charter only mentions rural post offices and does not mention the moratorium protection of small one-post-office-towns, according to a Canadian Union of Postal Workers press release.
It hardly seems as if one month is enough time to consult with a community about the proposed closure, moving or amalgamating of their post office. So far, there has been no release of the list of post offices covered by the moratorium.
Many people believe that a post office is one of the remaining central pillars of rural communities. But as regional governments push for high-speed internet for all in rural areas, our use of conventional mail services may decline even further.
An independent review of Canada Post conducted earlier this year revealed that the volume of letter mail is dropping by at least one per cent annually. The review also suggested that door-to-door delivery could be one way to tackle the postal service’s projected financial constraints. The study estimated that Canada Post must spend $3 billion during the next seven years to modernize equipment.
While the future of rural post offices is always a worry to rural residents, town and city dwellers may also face service changes. Community mailboxes, it seems, are more efficient than door-to-door delivery. 
The introduction of community mailboxes in urban areas won’t change much about urban-dwellers’ way of life. But the loss of a small town’s post office would be noticed.
It is easy to understand why postal workers are fighting to keep small post offices open. If our small-town post offices become unviable financially, it will be a tough sell for anyone to convince Canada Post or our federal government to take action to keep them open.
But as rural residents, we need to be thinking about the implications of such closures on our small towns. It is impossible to get something back once it has been lost. There will likely never be a post office again in Dalkeith; its post office recently closed.
Here in Vankleek Hill, citizens are still grappling to replace something lost many years ago: a doctor.
Everyone who lives in small towns today knows the importance of keeping what we have and working to make rural life sustainable. Residential development and the introduction of alternative energy initiatives on farm land will not solve small-town problems.
It is time to give our attention to rural planning to avoid further wasteful suburban development. Protecting farm land and planning for a future where the rural countryside is compatible with nearby cities is essential.
We need to consider what is important to us in our small towns and act now to ensure that our government representatives and local residents listen to our priorities.
We can all speak from where we live.
– L.S.