Vashon residents have for months been sharing their frustration with mail theft on the island, especially at the post office itself.

This weekend, the United States Postal Service (USPS) took action, limiting access to the P.O. box lobby to match the post office’s business hours. In our page 1 story, we lay out the details, as well as the stories of some of the many islanders who have shared their experiences with us.

This turn of events is unfortunate, and it will make life difficult for commuting or working islanders who rarely have time to access the post office during business hours. Nonetheless, some action had to be taken to secure the post office from further brazen break-ins, and we’re glad that this, at least, should drastically reduce the building’s vulnerability for now.

We hope that a more moderated solution — involving the fixing or modernizing of the boxes, and possibly the implementation of a keycard system or something similar — will come soon. We also have our eye (and public records requests) fixed on the investigation of these break-ins, and how those responsible are held accountable.

This entire affair carries a few lessons. First, the USPS needs to communicate more with islanders. Many weeks have passed since the break-ins started. We get that things move fast and the island is only one of the tens of thousands of post offices across the country. Still, islanders should have received earlier and detailed information about the break-ins and more advance notice of changes to lobby access.

Second, it’s a reminder that though we are an island in geography, we are not an island from crime.

Finally, let’s state a few obvious points: You should not take out anger or frustration on our local postal workers, who are doing their best to serve a busy island that gets a lot of letters and Amazon packages. They do not have access to a magical bag of replacement antique P.O. box parts nor a mystical crystal ball that can ward the post office from vandalism and theft.

And it’s their workplace that’s been violated, frighteningly so — so let’s share some sympathy with them, too.

But it’s also true that the squeaky wheel gets the grease. The island now only has one post office — and any disruptions or damage it receives directly reduce our ability to access the mail system. We’ve seen it with the ferries already: if you want something fixed, you have to holler a bit. So let’s holler at the USPS to get things fixed, not only our post office boxes but also our ability to access them reliably.