How to resolve AdBlock issue? Signed, sealed and delivered for 250 years: USPS marks a milestone with two new stamp releases
In celebration of two and a half centuries of continuous service, the U.S. Postal Service this week unveiled two stamp releases at its headquarters building.
The two stamp designs capture the essence of USPS, one honoring its deep-rooted history, the other highlighting its ubiquitous presence in everyday life.
“For the United States Postal Service, today is a milestone 250 years in the making,” said Postmaster General and Chief Executive Officer David Steiner on Thursday. “These stamps will serve as a window into our shared history. They represent enduring values that I — and every American — can learn from: perseverance, trust and imagination. As we unveil these stamps today, I ask all of you to use the mail to stay connected, especially when we feel ourselves starting to drift apart.”
Amber McReynolds, USPS Board of Governors chairwoman, joined the newly appointed Postmaster General for the Thursday ceremony.
“Today, we celebrate this magnificent organization which has shaped our nation’s culture, powered its economy and connected each one of us to each other for 250 years,” McReynolds said. “I hope these stamps will serve as reminders of the impact these tiny pieces of artwork have had on our shared democracy, our economy, and our connectivity as a nation.”
The founding of the postal system in 1775 was vital to achieving independence and laying the foundation for a unified nation.
Today, America’s first communications network still serves the same ideals, connecting individuals, communities and businesses through an exchange of ideas, information and goods.
The Postal Service’s 640,000 employees exemplify those ideals every day. Letter carriers make up more than half of the USPS workforce. In snow, rain, heat and gloom of night, carriers reach the American public where they live and work, six and sometimes seven days a week. They are friends, neighbors and in some cases, heroes. Making their appointed rounds regularly, Postal Service employees are members of our communities — a human presence with a unique, observant familiarity with the neighborhoods they serve.
In some situations, carriers go above and beyond the call of duty, being the first to recognize a problem and alert emergency personnel. These actions have saved lives on many occasions and are recognized under the Postmaster General Heroes’ Program.
Postal operations are often some of the first services restored after a natural disaster; the presence of carriers offers a sense of normalcy and helps maintain connections within communities.
Behind the scenes and at America’s doorstep, 640,000 dedicated employees work toward a shared mission to provide the nation with reliable, affordable, universal mail service. Whether it’s the carrier delivering mail, the mechanic keeping their vehicle running, the retail associate at a local Post Office location or the mail handlers ensuring that every envelope or package gets sent to the right destination, USPS employees are working together to serve the country.
The Postal Service is a marvel of the modern age and of the cumulative experience of 250 years. The everyday story of connecting Americans near and far by mail is meticulously depicted in the artwork for one of the stamp sets being released today: 250 Years of Delivering. Offering a bird’s-eye view of a bustling town, each individual stamp is a frame of sequential art that tells the story of a mail carrier’s journey as she walks her daily route. The story progresses clockwise through a year’s four seasons.
The artwork also contains numerous postal icons such as collection boxes, a post rider on horseback and delivery vehicles. Collectively, the pane represents the faithful presence of USPS throughout the year.
Chris Ware created the stamp artwork and co-designed the pane with Antonio Alcalá, an art director for USPS.
The 250 Years of Delivering stamps are issued as a pane of 20 Forever stamps, which will always be equal in value to the current First-Class Mail 1-ounce price. News of the stamps is being shared with the hashtag #250YearsOfDelivering.
‘Putting a Stamp on the American Experience’ booklet
Postage stamps delight, entertain and educate, sparking curiosity about history, art, nature and science. Highlighting a wide range of subjects and history gives the U.S. stamp program its remarkable range.
The 32-page prestige booklet, “Putting a Stamp on the American Experience,” provides an in-depth look at some of the Postal Service’s most popular stamps.
The booklet, only the fourth ever issued by the Postal Service, is illustrated with specially selected stamps and artwork from more than 75 previous issuances, both recent and vintage.
Some pages in the booklet pay tribute to long-running series or spotlight interests such as national parks, sports, nature and flags. Other pages show how each new generation of designers commemorates traditional subjects in the visual language of their time.
The booklet also points out recent innovations in printing and recognizes the importance of stamps that raise awareness of, and sometimes funds for, important causes.
Available exclusively with the “Putting a Stamp on the American Experience” booklet are two self-adhesive sheets of 10 stamps featuring the first postmaster general, Benjamin Franklin. The stamp represents both tradition and innovation by featuring a “reframed” modern interpretation of an 1875 reproduction of one of the first two official U.S. postage stamps from 1847.
As one of the first U.S. stamp subjects, Franklin is a longtime icon of the stamp program, appearing on more than 100 issuances in the 178-year history of American stamps.
Appointed postmaster general of the Colonies by the Second Continental Congress in 1775, Franklin had previously served as both postmaster of Philadelphia and one of two deputy postmasters general appointed by the British Crown.
He appreciated that the postal system could help unite the Colonies — and the nation they became. As a printer, scientist and diplomat, he played a monumental role in shaping American culture, and his postal legacy of adaptability and innovation continues to inspire the modern-day Postal Service.
Rendered in blue instead of the original reddish brown, the stamp reproduction was created by combining two printing techniques.
The intaglio process, which incises the image into metal plates, was used to evoke the texture and appearance of classic engraved stamps. The surrounding area balances tradition with modernity by rendering it with smooth precision through offset printing.
The Benjamin Franklin stamps are issued as Forever stamps and will only be available through the purchase of the “Putting a Stamp on the American Experience” prestige booklet. Booklets are available for purchase through the Postal Store, by calling 844-737-7826, or by mail through USA Philatelic. News of the stamp and booklet is being shared with the hashtag #USPS250booklet.
Stamp Encore Contest
The U.S. Postal Service launched the Stamp Encore contest, offering the public a chance to vote on any of 25 preselected, previously issued stamps as part of the 2026 stamp program.
The public can go to StampsForever.com/vote to cast votes and put a “stamp” on an upcoming release. Voting will take place from July 23 to Sept. 30.
Postal products
Customers may purchase stamps and other philatelic products through the Postal Store at usps.com/shopstamps, by calling 844-737-7826, by mail through USA Philatelic, or at Post Office locations nationwide.
For officially licensed stamp products, shop the USPS Officially Licensed Collection on Amazon. Additional information on stamps, First Day of Issue Ceremonies and stamp-inspired products can be found at StampsForever.com.
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CDFW completes 2025 Waterfowl Breeding Population Survey
The California Department of Fish and Wildlife, or CDFW, has completed its 2025 waterfowl breeding population survey.
The results of the survey show both mallard and total duck species have increased this year.
The breeding population of mallards increased from 177,828 to 265,640 (a 49% increase), and total ducks (all species combined) increased from 373,864 to 474,495 (a 27% increase). Mallards remain below the long-term average by 16%.
“The survey indicated an increase in mallard abundance, and habitat conditions were good in northern California, so we expect average to above-average production for all waterfowl species,” said CDFW Waterfowl Program Biologist Melanie Weaver.
Since 1948, CDFW biologists and warden-pilots have conducted this survey annually using fixed-wing aircraft.
The population estimates are for those areas where the vast majority of waterfowl nesting occurs in California, including wetland and agricultural areas in northeastern California, throughout the Central Valley, the Suisun Marsh and some coastal valleys.
The complete 2025 California Waterfowl Breeding Population Survey Report is available at the CDFW website.
The majority of California’s wintering duck population originates from breeding areas surveyed by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, or USFWS, in Alaska and Canada, and these results should be available by late August.
CDFW survey information, along with similar data from other Pacific Flyway states, is used by the USFWS and the Pacific Flyway Council when setting hunting regulations for the Pacific Flyway states, including California.
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Space News: Astronomers witness newborn planet sculpting the dust around it
Astronomers may have caught a still-forming planet in action, carving out an intricate pattern in the gas and dust that surrounds its young host star.
Using ESO’s Very Large Telescope, or VLT, they observed a planetary disc with prominent spiral arms, finding clear signs of a planet nestled in its inner regions. This is the first time astronomers have detected a planet candidate embedded inside a disc spiral.
“We will never witness the formation of Earth, but here, around a young star 440 light-years away, we may be watching a planet come into existence in real time,” said Francesco Maio, a doctoral researcher at the University of Florence, Italy, and lead author of this study, published this month in Astronomy & Astrophysics.
The potential planet-in-the-making was detected around the star HD 135344B, within a disc of gas and dust around it called a protoplanetary disc.
The budding planet is estimated to be twice the size of Jupiter and as far from its host star as Neptune is from the Sun. It has been observed shaping its surroundings within the protoplanetary disc as it grows into a fully formed planet.
Protoplanetary discs have been observed around other young stars, and they often display intricate patterns, such as rings, gaps or spirals.
Astronomers have long predicted that these structures are caused by baby planets, which sweep up material as they orbit around their parent star. But, until now, they had not caught one of these planetary sculptors in the act.
In the case of HD 135344B’s disc, swirling spiral arms had previously been detected by another team of astronomers using Spectro-Polarimetric High-contrast Exoplanet REsearch, or SPHERE, an instrument on ESO’s VLT. However, none of the previous observations of this system found proof of a planet forming within the disc.
Now, with observations from the new VLT’s Enhanced Resolution Imager and Spectrograph, or ERIS, instrument, the researchers say they may have found their prime suspect.
The team spotted the planet candidate right at the base of one of the disc’s spiral arms, exactly where theory had predicted they might find the planet responsible for carving such a pattern.
“What makes this detection potentially a turning point is that, unlike many previous observations, we are able to directly detect the signal of the protoplanet, which is still highly embedded in the disc,” said Maio, who is based at the Arcetri Astrophysical Observatory, a centre of Italy’s National Institute for Astrophysics, or INAF. “This gives us a much higher level of confidence in the planet’s existence, as we’re observing the planet’s own light.”
A star’s companion is born
A different team of astronomers have also recently used the ERIS instrument to observe another star, V960 Mon, one that is still in the very early stages of its life. In a study published on 18 July in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, the team report that they have found a companion object to this young star. The exact nature of this object remains a mystery.
The new study, led by Anuroop Dasgupta, a doctoral researcher at ESO and at the Diego Portales University in Chile, follows up observations of V960 Mon made a couple of years ago.
Those observations, made with both SPHERE and the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array, or ALMA, revealed that the material orbiting V960 Mon is shaped into a series of intricate spiral arms.
They also showed that the material is fragmenting, in a process known as “gravitational instability,” when large clumps of the material around a star contract and collapse, each with the potential to form a planet or a larger object.
“That work revealed unstable material but left open the question of what happens next. With ERIS, we set out to find any compact, luminous fragments signalling the presence of a companion in the disc — and we did,” said Dasgupta. The team found a potential companion object very near to one of the spiral arms observed with SPHERE and ALMA. The team say that this object could either be a planet in formation, or a ‘brown dwarf’ — an object bigger than a planet that didn’t gain enough mass to shine as a star.
If confirmed, this companion object may be the first clear detection of a planet or brown dwarf forming by gravitational instability.
The European Southern Observatory enables scientists worldwide to discover the secrets of the Universe for the benefit of all.
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Planning Commission delays vote on Guenoc Valley project until August
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — The question of whether Lake County should move forward with the Guenoc Valley project — a large-scale, mixed-use resort and residential community outside of Middletown — returned to the Lake County Planning Commission this week with a new environmental impact report.
After four hours of discussion, the commission on Thursday postponed making a decision on the project’s new environmental impact report, or EIR, along with requests for various permits and amendments, including zoning changes to create a new district for mixed-use development.
The commission voted unanimously to continue the item to a special meeting scheduled for Friday, Aug. 8.
The project proposes to span approximately 16,000 acres located in southeastern Lake County near Middletown, encompassing 82 existing parcels.
Staff’s report explains that, at full buildout, throughout multiple phases, the resort project would allow for the development of up to 400 hotel rooms, 450 resort residential units, 1,400 residential estates, and 500 workforce co-housing units within the zoning district.
Phase one would include the phased subdivision to allow up to 385 residential villas, 141 resort residential units, 147 hotel units, accessory resorts and commercial uses; a subdivision and rezoning of an off-site parcel to accommodate 21 single family residences with optional accessory dwelling units, 29 duplex units in 15 structures, and a community clubhouse and associated infrastructure, a proposed water supply well on an off-site parcel and pipeline located adjacent to and within Butts Canyon Road, along with intersection and electrical transmission line improvements.
The project applicant, San Francisco-based Lotusland Investment Holdings, has owned the property since 2016. The company is owned by Chinese developer Yiming Xu who immigrated to Canada from China in 1996. Since the early 2000s, he has been involved in various real estate and luxury resort developments in China.
Commissioners seek more time to consider the project
One major reason for the delay is the commission’s concerns over inadequate infrastructure and evacuation plans.
“The problem is not necessarily the project itself, but our infrastructure in the county — how can we build the roads to allow for this capacity so that is not a problem for this project and for any future projects that come forward,” said Planning Commission Chair Everardo Chavez Perez, referencing members of the public who spoke up as Valley Fire survivors who personally experienced that disaster’s trauma 10 years ago.
“What I’ve seen so far doesn’t satisfy me unless there's some more routes out and greater road structure,” Commissioner Maile Field said during the discussion on wildfire risks and a countywide evacuation plan.
Community Development Department Director Mireya Turner said that the countywide evacuation plan is still in progress. She also mentioned that the project has gone through “years of changes in design, changes in road standards, detailed analysis with the transportation experts” which resulted in the California attorney general withdrawing from a lawsuit against the county over the project.
The time limit also played a part in a delayed decision, the commissioners said.
The project has 34 documents attached to the meeting agenda packet, ranging from environmental reports and government planning documents to ordinance drafts and tribal comments.
Commissioners said that they only received the documents last Friday evening and the time they had for review was not enough.
“The project is huge,” said Commissioner Monica Rosenthal, who said she has been involved with the project for several years. "I’ve got to tell you, the onslaught of papers and materials we have to click through and read is quite overwhelming.”
“It is a lot of documents that we have to read and a lot of things taken into consideration and at the time as it is right now, I can’t vote on it as it is until we have a little bit more time to think about it and assess,” said Chavez Perez.
Toward the end of the meeting, Kevin Case, a development partner for the project spoke up: “If I could tell you the time and the experts and the resumes of the people that have gone into putting these documents together, it's disheartening when they haven't been read.”
Case asked the commissioners to read the wildfire protection plan and the wildfire risk assessment, among the 34 documents, regarding the fire-safety designs and mitigation plans for the project, conducted by Cal Fire and U.C. Berkeley experts.
“There's not another project in California that I'm aware of that has this many mitigation measures and design measures implemented into it,” Case said.
The Guenoc Valley project returns after litigation
This isn’t the project’s first EIR.
The original EIR for the project was approved by the Board of Supervisors in July, 2020. Two months later, the Center for Biological Diversity and the California Native Plant Society sued the county over the project, with the California Attorney General’s Office intervening in support of them.
In January, 2022, Lake County Superior Court Judge J. David Markham ruled that the EIR was inadequate in its community evacuation analysis.
The Center for Biological Diversity appealed the case, and in October 2024, the California First District Appellate Court ruled that a new EIR must be prepared as the previous document didn’t disclose the project’s wildfire ignition risks.
The new EIR and various zoning and permit requests under review this week, if approved by the Planning Commission at its Aug. 8 special meeting, will be moved forward to the Board of Supervisors for their final approval.
Despite the new document, key concerns remain.
The concerns raised by commissioners and the members of the public on Thursday surrounded wildfire risks and evacuation plans, as well as infrastructure, workforce housing and impact on farmland.
A presentation during the meeting outlined some of the wildfire mitigation and prevention plans.
These measures include designing an emergency access road called the Grange Road connector; removing development from some of the remote, fire-prone areas and consolidating it in the center of the property — which slightly increased density; and ensuring that no dead-end roads exist, in compliance with the state’s new fire-safe regulations.
Annalee Sanborn of Acorn Environmental, the presenter, also concluded that the project has “significant and unavoidable impact” on various environmental aspects: aesthetics, agricultural and forestry resources, greenhouse gas emissions, noise and transportation/traffic.
“There is quite a bit of prime, unique or locally important farmland on the Guenoc Valley site,” said Sanborn of the impact on agriculture, adding that up to 325 acres of farmland across the 16,000 acre site could potentially be impacted.
Sanborn said she is hired by Lotusland but works under the direction of county staff.
Concerns versus support
The meeting chambers were more than half full, with members of the public and developer representatives in attendance.
During public comment, opposition against the project focused on fire safety, workforce housing for hundreds of workers, and long-term impact on the community.
Some referenced their first-hand memories from the Valley Fire, which 10 years ago took four lives, destroyed nearly 2,000 structures, burned 76,067 acres and did an estimated $1.5 billion in overall damage.
For the survivors and witnesses, “No matter how many mitigations you put in and with all due respect to all of the effort put in — we need wider roads near Hidden Valley,” said Middletown Art Center Director Lisa Kaplan, who is also a Valley Fire survivor.
“I'm telling you, getting out of Hidden Valley was terrible during the Valley Fire. So imagine adding the Valley Oaks [project], adding workforce in Middletown, adding all of Guenoc pouring out into the Grange. How are we going to get out?” said Kaplan. “It's frightening, and there's many more people who were traumatized by that event than me. But you can take my tears and you can put them in your bucket of compassion, and you can say this is something to consider more than what is written so far.”
“Is Lake County ready for this? Look at all the infrastructure changes that are going to have to be made, needed and supported in order to be able to bring all of this to fruition within our county,” said long-time Hidden Valley Lake resident Bill Waite. “I know our roads are not ready for this. I know our health organizations are not ready for this. Our retail is not ready for this.”
Rev. Julia Bono of Rainbow Church in Middletown voiced strong community concerns about the worker co-housing site proposed for Santa Clara Avenue as part of the project, citing reasons such as flood and wildfire risks and lack of infrastructure and community engagement.
“Let me be clear, we are not opposed to the Guenoc Valley development. We are opposed to development that disregards the will, investments and well-being of the Middletowners who were living here first,” Bono said.
Farm Bureau Executive Director Rebecca Harper spoke on Zoom against the project, citing the project’s “significant and unavoidable impact” on agriculture as Sanborn presented.
“Agriculture is not just the land use, it's a way of life, a local economic engine and a cornerstone of our identity in Lake County,” Harper said. “We are also wary of the narrative that this project will usher in broad economic prosperity. The promise of an economic windfall should not come at the expense of irreplaceable farmland. Prime soils once lost cannot be replaced. Open space and rural character cannot be rezoned back into existence once paved over.”
Those who strongly supported the project, cited more jobs and greater economic outlook in the long run.
“There will also be a creation of long term well-paying jobs, which I think is much welcome and needed in the county, and it will also inject millions of dollars into our local budgets. So that's a huge plus to our county,” said Amanda Martin, Lake County Chamber of Commerce chief executive officer.
“I also just want to point out that sometimes this ‘not-in-our-backyard’ mentality, can also prevent growth and prevent opportunity that does seem like a positive opportunity for our county,” she added.
“It is just an amazing project that I was excited to hear about when I first heard about it about seven or eight years ago,” said Greg Folsom, who’s on the board of directors of the commerce chamber and is the former city manager for Clearlake. “Hopefully when we approve this, and what a great improvement this has been to the county, it's going to create jobs, generate huge property tax, transient occupancy tax and sales tax for the county.”
Richard Durham, a Lake County resident who raised two children here, said he was “totally impressed” by the project when he went out on a tour of the project months ago. He said his two children had left Lake County because there were no jobs here for them.
“I've been waiting all these years for projects like this to come along and help the community,” he said.
Email Lingzi Chen at
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Potential for thunderstorms leads to red flag warning
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — A forecast of high winds and the potential for thunderstorms has resulted in a red flag warning being issued for the northern portion of Lake County and some other counties around the region.
The National Weather Service’s red flag warning will be in effect from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Friday.
A red flag warning means that critical fire weather conditions — which can be a combination of strong winds, low relative humidity and warm temperatures that can contribute to extreme fire behavior — are either occurring now, or will shortly, the National Weather Service said.
There was some rain in parts of Lake County on Thursday night, and the National Weather Service’s forecast said that scattered dry thunderstorms are possible on Friday in northern Lake County, along with Trinity and eastern Mendocino counties.
The forecast said gusty and erratic outflow winds up to 50 miles per hour are possible, along with lightning strikes that may start fires.
Isolated showers are possible starting after 11 a.m. Friday, when temperatures are supposed to be in the mid-80s. Chances of precipitation are 20%.
Daytime temperatures in northern Lake County are expected to hover in the mid-80s, before rising into the 90s by Sunday. Nighttime temperatures are forecast to be in the mid to high-90s. Thunderstorms are possible again Friday afternoon and evening.
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