“Keeping politics out of postal bargaining has served the parties, the American people and the mailing public very well for 40 years”
April 7, 2011: This week’s unprecedented congressional hearing on a negotiated agreement between the U.S. Postal Service and one of its craft unions shows just what letter carriers and the rest of the postal workforce are up against in the 112th Congress.
On Tuesday, the Republican-led House Oversight and Government Reform Committee held a hearing called “Are Postal Workforce Costs Sustainable?” – aimed at scrutinizing the tentative pact recently hammered out between USPS and the American Postal Workers Union. Though the pact has yet to be voted on by the union’s members, some legislators were eager to voice their opinions of it – with several anti-labor committee members contending that it didn’t go far enough in reducing postal costs.
Such negotiations have traditionally been left to the parties involved, and the president of the APWU as well as the Postmaster General testified about their satisfaction with the agreement they had reached. That didn’t stop some legislators from offering their criticism of various aspects of the agreement and, more broadly, of a process they claimed – without offering any proof – is biased toward labor.
Three of the four witnesses spoke in clear terms about the value of the USPS to our country and its residents, about the ways that good labor-management relations have helped lead to increased productivity and customer satisfaction, and about the give-and-take that produced the tentative agreement. A good number of legislators also voiced strong support for the Postal Service and its employees.
But they did so in the context of a hearing clearly aimed at discrediting the agreement and raising doubts about the collective-bargaining process itself – an effort that will not surprise those who live in Wisconsin, Ohio or other states where local officials have sought to vilify the notion of public employees engaging in bargaining.
“What we saw in Tuesday’s hearing was nothing short of a kangaroo court,” NALC President Fredric V. Rolando said. “We thought that Congress had gotten out of the business of interfering with the collective-bargaining agreements of government workers, but it turns out that some clearly want back in.
“Keeping politics out of postal bargaining has served the parties, the American people and the mailing public very well for 40 years – we have decent jobs, the mailers get high-quality service at very affordable rates and the taxpayers don’t have to foot the bill,” Rolando said.
“This type of congressional interference,” he added, “makes the results of next year’s elections all the more important, and the need to begin preparing now for those contests all the more urgent.”
What really matters
Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA) focused on the tentative contract.
“We have deep concerns that some of the provisions of the [APWU] contract may in fact be the wrong direction,” Issa said, “to less flexibility, less ability to trim the workforce and less ability to in the future make the kinds of investments we need to make.” Rep. John Mica (R-FL) repeatedly referred to the Postal Service as a dinosaur in the age of the Internet.
At the same time, the hearing was replete with positive comments about the USPS and employees who for six consecutive years have been named by the public as the country’s most-trusted federal workers. The central role the Postal Service and its employees play in America was a constant theme, as was the high proportion of veterans and other groups that form the Service’s workforce.
The real financial situation at the Postal Service also was frequently mentioned, as several representatives and witnesses pointed to the fact that the agency’s fiscal problems have nothing to do with labor costs and everything to do with the 2006 congressional mandate that the USPS pre-fund future retiree health benefits to the tune of $5.5 billion a year. Without that requirement, which no other agency or company faces, the Postal Service would have been profitable the past four years – even with the worst recession in 80 years and even with competition from the Internet.
Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe, one of the four witnesses called to testify at the hearing, repeatedly pointed out that reforming the retiree health benefits pre-funding mandate and gaining access to USPS surpluses in the Civil Service Retirement System and the Federal Employees Retirement System are key pieces of the financial puzzle.
“What we need is your help on these big issues that are beyond our control,” Donahoe told the committee. “We have excellent relations with our employee unions and management associations. Take care of those things and you’ll never see us again.”
Several committee members, including ranking member Rep. Stephen Lynch (D-MA), Rep. Bruce Braley (D-IA) and Rep. Peter Welch (D-VT), praised the work of all postal employees – letter carriers as well as clerks and mail handlers – and congratulated the Postal Service and the APWU for arriving at a negotiated agreement that includes some gains and some losses for both sides. Rep. Danny Davis (D-IL) called the new pact “one of the best labor-management agreements I’ve seen in a long, long time.”
The fight ahead
But for every instance where Donahoe or Democrats made their case, anti-labor members of the committee just as often returned to criticism of the APWU-USPS agreement. Many appeared to favor ideas that tipped bargaining scales in the Service’s favor and that would reduce workers’ benefits and wages.
Also called to testify were APWU President Cliff Guffey as well as Postal Board of Governors Chairman Louis Giuliano and member James Miller. Although Miller acknowledged that the Board had unanimously approved of the APWU-USPS deal, most of his comments during the hearing – which he stated were made solely on his own behalf – served largely to agree with Issa’s unfounded complaints about postal pay and benefits.
Miller, appointed by George W. Bush and a former Board of Governors chairman, has made no secret of his interest in privatizing the Postal Service and nullifying its collective bargaining agreements with its craft unions.
Rolando put the session in a broader context.
“We letter carriers are fooling ourselves if we believe that we are going to get a pass from these anti-labor forces that are unfairly targeting firefighters and police, nurses and teachers, and are doing so with little regard for the facts,” he said.
“And in this atmosphere, it won’t be impossible to get our legislative agenda passed, but it will be extremely difficult. It will take all of us standing together, and working with our allies on Capitol Hill and elsewhere.”
When all is said and done I will be able to retire with 25 years service. Got 3 left.
Would say good-bye now for $25K can cut 3% and celebrate my retirement alone with a good lite beer.
Sheree you say your money looks different than up north. Are they paying you in Confederate script?
Wow. That was pretty incoherent. Southerners really don’t like that book learnin’.
I REALLY HOPE ENOUGH WORKERS ARE KEEPIN UP WITH WHAT’S GOIN ON AND READIN ALL THESE POST, WE ARE FIGHTIN FOR A NO VOTE IN THE SOUTH, AND YES OUR MONEY DOES LOOK DIFFERENT FROM SOMEONE WHO WORKS UP NORTH OR WHERE THE COST OF LIVING IS HIGHER SO THAT SHOULD SAY A LOT TO YOU NO RAISE SO VOTE NO
I REALLY HOPE I AM NOT AT WORK THE DAY SOMEONE GOES POSTAL, I SEE IT COMIN EVERYONE IS ON EDGE THESE DAY’S NOT KNOW WHAT’S GOIN TO HAPPEN TO OUR 40HR WORK WEEK IF SOME OF THESE FOLKS DO VOTE YES WITHOUT REALLY UNDERSTANDIN WHAT IS GOIN TO HAPPEN IF THEY DO VOTE NO IN THE SOUTH
The question is cost sustainable for Congress?
Issa would be happy with this tentative contract is he took the time to understand it. It has all the provisions needed to replace the current work force with lower paying jobs and not even have to pay unemployment benefits by forcing current workers to resign or accept a 25% pay cut. How could he not be happy with that? No layoff would be needed or desired under this agreement to cut the throats of the current workers. To put people in a position to either accept a 30 hour job with flexible hours or get excessed 200 miles away, since there will not be any residual positions, or resign without any compensation, sounds like we may see what going postal can really become by people who see losing their jobs, homes, and probably families as a good enough reason to feel they have lost everything worth living for in this day of high unemployment. APWU members better consider this vote very very carefully!
Carrier is right. the P.O. is not taxpayer funded so Congress needs to concern themselves with taxpayers money. Jed, I worked for the P.O. for over 30 years and there are many issues of inefficency. However, as long as we want to provide universal service and deliver to Joe Blow in rural areas we are at a competetive disadvantage with UPS and FedEx. The P.O. has not outlived its existence. Ask UPS to deliver to a rural area and they will tell you to stick your package up the old dirt road!
This is another example of how the Republican party has been bought by “Big Business”. The Republicans raced to bailout Wall St, the car companies and the banks; then they steal the Post Office’s money and claim that their business model is broken?
If not for Congress passing the legislation in 2006, thanks to Susan Collins in Maine, which tllk $5.5 billion a year away from the Post Office, the Post Office would have been showing profits each year since.
Fire Congress for bad business practices !!!!!!!!!
Looks like Congress needs to take a look at their Trillion $ debt and make some changes in their pay and benefits,and taking USPS money to pay others.We are like the police,fire and military a service to the taxpayers,not like UPS,or Fed EX.
People, listen to yourself. We have not been taxpayer funded for years and the only real problem, and I’ll say this slowly so you who haven’t understood will, Congress nees to stop making the postal service pay 5,500,000,000.00 to pre-fund (everyone see that PRE) our future retirees retirement. People who aren’t even hired as of yet and we because of congress need to prefund their retirement. did anyone see the article where congress can use the postal services retirement in cases of emergency? If you had you would understand what these worthless politicians are doing, writing checks the taxpayer just can’t continue to pay. And again I’ll say the post office uses zero taxpayer dollars but since congress can’t continue to blast the taxpayer they need to look at other avenues rather then CUT SPENDING which is what most houses do in time of crisis.
Jeds a dope.
Jed Says – The USPS granting collective bargaining right setup the Postal service to price itself out of the messaging,parcel , and expedited mail service as it was restricted to deal as a business in the market place
FED Ex – is non union – how come it is cheaper to ship USPS
UPS – is Union -how come it is cheaper to ship USPS
The USPS plays the Serrano of being a great institution that has held and kept people and businesses connected. This is true to a point in time but like the Wright brothers first flight at Kitty Hawk time changes all thing; from the first airplane time has evolved to jet air travel around the world.
Ben Franklin AND THE Colonial postal system evolved into people connecting around the world. The time comes for all things to change; air travel evolved to a jet discovery age into outer space. The Postal Service lost to the Internet in connecting people.
The USPS should be placed with the has be-ens in the Smithsonian Museum as it has outlived its purpose and should it cease to exist the only thing missed would be the continuous loss of money and less jobs for so called high paid executives who are paid to use their intellectual properties to get a return for their employer but evidently lacking when employed on the buddy system at the top tier of USPS management..
The USPS granting collective bargaining right setup the Postal service to price itself out of the messaging,parcel , and expedited mail service as it was restricted to deal as a business in the market place.
the only branches of government that needs to be trimmed are both the house and the senate. show Americans you mean business by taking a cut in your pay , then the next move should be , pay a percentage of your health coverage before you knock anyone else s plan. lead by example
Look at the military pay scale and benefits, and the postal service could be viable. The postal service provides its customers with a service that is needed but the pay scale should be more in line with the military pay scale. The postal service could be a great institution to work for again, but the personnel have to want to be there for more than just the overtime pay….