Two Congressional Panels Approve Bills to Continue Six-Day Mail Delivery
Two Congressional Panels Support Six-Day Service
APWU Web News Article 074-2010, July 30, 2010
Two congressional panels voted on July 29 to approve spending bills that would require the Postal Service to continue to provide mail delivery six days per week. The two bills — one in the Senate and one in the House — still have a long way to go before they could become law, however.
“These are important steps, but we must clear many more hurdles in order to stop the Postal Service from eliminating Saturday delivery,” said APWU Legislative & Political Director Myke Reid. “The full Senate and House would have to approve the bills, and then the two versions would have to be reconciled to resolve any differences between them.” Spending bills are traditionally very difficult to pass, he said.
The Senate Appropriations Committee voted 18-12 to approve a spending bill for Fiscal Year 2011 that would prevent the U.S. Postal Service from reducing mail delivery from six days to five. The House Financial Services and General Government Subcommittee voted by voice.
On July 28, Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT), a member of the Senate Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government, announced that he had persuaded the members of the Senate panel to reject the USPS proposal. Sen. Tester explained the importance of six-day mail delivery to rural America.
“Folks in rural and frontier communities often rely on their Saturday mail to bring them the things they need to live. Unlike in urban areas where folks can walk down the block to the local drug store, many Montanans live long distances from the nearest pharmacy or newsstand. Getting mail six days per week is part of what keeps rural America strong and thriving.”
The bill notes the crucial role of six-day service. It says, “The Committee believes that six-day mail delivery is one of the most important services provided by the Federal Government to its citizens. Especially in rural and small-town America, this critical service is the linchpin that serves to bind the Nation together.”
PMG Potter’s Response To White House On Pilot Test For Five-Day Delivery
Excerpts from PMG John Potter letter regarding Pilot test on Five-Day Delivery:
From an operational standpoint a pilot test conducted on a regional basis would increase some of our costs in the short term. For example, we either would have to make manual changes to mail processing sorting schemes and payroll or utilize information technology to program such changes for a limited time or geographic area. We believe that our information technology programming changes, estimated to cost $10 million-$12 million for a national, full-time implementation, would grow significantly to accommodate a test, as would administrative costs if we decided to forego programming changes in favor of performing manual processing for the defined test period. We also would have to communicate the pilot’s parameters to the public and employees. During such a test we would be unable to make the permanent, necessary changes to our delivery workforce, transportation networks, and mail processing operations that would yield the projected $3.1 billion savings. The largest financial impact of a pilot would be the fact that many career employees in the pilot area would have to be paid not to work or be relocated, white many of our non-career and part-time employees would see their wages reduced or eliminated. Any savings in wages that the Postal Service would realize during the test would immediately disappear at the test’s conclusion.
It may be helpful for me to offer a distinct example of the internal challenges that a test would present. In City Letter Carrier operations, full -time, regular City Carriers generally are assigned to a single delivery route that they service five days per week. These Carriers are scheduled to have Sunday off as well as one other day of the week. A category of full-time Carriers, known as Carrier Technicians. also are scheduled to work five days per week; but instead of servicing the same route each day, they cover the day off- and the route–of five different carriers. The five-day delivery proposal anticipates the reduction of approximately 25,000 full-time City Carrier assignments and $2.2 billion in annual savings in City Carrier operations. The savings are generated primarily by the fact that under a five-day delivery model, regular Carriers assigned to a single route would have Saturday and Sunday off, eliminating the need for the Carrier Technician and Relief Carrier assignments. We plan to transition full-time Carrier Technician assignments into Carrier positions (that cover a single route) that become available through attrition (a significant percentage of our current workforce is eligible for retirement between now and 2014). Under a pilot test we would be unable to carry out this Carrier alignment, and during the test itself, we would have a surplus of Letter Carriers for whom we would have to find productive work within their craft, and if unsuccessful, pay them to perform no work because our contract with the National Association of Letter Carriers guarantees full-time, regular Carriers a 40-hour work week. Under our national proposal for five-day delivery we Intend to preserve the employment of our career City Carriers.
read letter from Postamaster General John Potter submitted to the Postal Regulatory Commission
Black Postal Workers Brace For Proposed Cuts
From National Public Radio:
For decades, the U.S. Postal Service has provided many communities of color with a reliable career option with steady benefits. But proposed budget and service cuts — including eliminating Saturday deliveries — threaten the livelihoods of many career postal workers. To get a sense of how communities of color will be affected by these proposed cuts, host Michel Martin speaks with William Burrus, president of the American Postal Workers Union. Also joining the discussion is Philip Rubio, the author of There’s Always Work at the Post Office: African American Postal Workers and the Fight for Jobs, Justice and Equality. click here to listen to the story
Schedule of PRC Hearings On USPS Request for Rate Increase and 5-Day Delivery
Filed under: mail delivery, postal, postal news, rate increase, usps
From the Postal Regulatory Commission (PRC)
Schedule for Hearings on Postage Rate Increase
HEARINGS in Docket N2010-1:
July 14 at 9:30 am …
July 16 at 9:30 am …
July 20 at 9:30 am …
July 21 at 9:30 am
July 22 at 9:30 am /
Five-Day Delivery Would Mean 40,000-50,000 Fewer Letter Carriers
The least painful option
Al DeSarro, spokesman for the western area of the United States Postal Service, said surveys show that elimination of Saturday mail delivery is by far the most favored option for trimming the post office’s losses
Cutting Saturday delivery also wouldn’t be the first time the agency has tried that option. Back in 1957, according to CNN.com, the postmaster general implemented five-day service — but the change lasted just one Saturday. Public furor was so great that additional funding was immediately allocated and mail was delivered the very next Saturday.”
Down the road, and we’re talking years from now, we won’t need as many carriers because we won’t have to support that sixth-day delivery,” “It’s estimated that probably between 40,000 and 50,000 fewer carrier positions nationwide will be needed.”
Postal Commentator Questions PRC Chairman’s Remarks On Five-Day Delivery
From Postcom.org
The following is an extraordinary letter to the editor of the New York Times from long-time postal sage Murray Comarow:
The Postal Service’s proposal to switch to five-day delivery is complex and controversial. [New York Times article "Sides Form Over Threat to Saturday Mail Service," 7-6-10] Congress has therefore directed the Postal Regulatory Commission to study the issue; its recommendations are expected in October.
But Ruth Y. Goldway, the Commission’s Chairwoman, apparently has already made up her mind. The article quotes her as saying, “”The Postal Service in fact should be expanding its accessibility and delivery capability to meet those needs. The long-term future of the Postal Service may be limited by their interest in reducing service today.”
She is certainly entitled to her opinion, but it is safe to say that Congress expected a serious, credible study leading to recommendations by the PRC’s five presidentially-appointed commissioners. This shoot-from-the-hip comment by Mrs. Goldway is not exactly new and tends to undermine confidence in the Commission.
I don’t know how the other four commissioners feel about Mrs. Goldway’s pre-emptive remarks; perhaps the Times should ask them. I’d guess they would rightly say, “No comment until we report to Congress.”
USPS Asks To Eliminate Saturday Delivery – Congress Still Has Questions
Excerpts from a report issued by INSTITUTE FOR RESEARCH ON THE ECONOMICS OF TAXATION (IRET)
Since 1983, Congress has annually included a rider in appropriations bills requiring the Postal Service to deliver mail six days a week. This paper examines the main developments since early 2009, when the Postal Service requested authority to eliminate the sixth delivery day.
• The Service has fleshed out the details of its five-day-a-week delivery plan.
• It has updated its estimate of the expected net savings: $3.1 billion yearly based on 2009 data and $40 billion over the next 10 years.
• The Service recently asked its regulator, the Postal Regulatory Commission (PRC), for an advisory opinion on five-day delivery, and the PRC expects to issue its findings in the Fall.
• Plunging mail volume and huge losses in 2009 and 2010 intensify the sense of urgency.
• Studies commissioned by the Service predict that a continuing mail volume decline and a shift away from highly profitable first class mail will produce monumental deficits over the next 10 years unless the Service implements major changes. A Government Accountability Office (GAO) study concurs that the Postal Service’s current business model is not financially sustainable.
• The Service has developed a 10-year business plan (the “Action Plan”) in which five-day delivery is a key element, expected to close about one-third of the residual 10-year deficit.
The Postal Service has sensibly cast five-day street delivery in terms of trade-offs. Do the benefits of six-day delivery justify the costs? Would dropping Saturday delivery be less harmful than other policy alternatives? The Postal Service claims that five-day delivery would be among the least painful options for postal customers.
Alternatives to five-day delivery are hiking postal rates or in other ways boosting revenue, cutting costs beyond the savings contemplated in the 10-year plan, deferring costs (a temporary measure), borrowing (another temporary measure), or obtaining money from Congress (ultimately taxpayers).
The most attractive alternative, which would save more than enough to allow six-day delivery to continue, would be bringing postal wages and benefits more into line with those in the private sector and quickly rationalizing the Service’s nationwide network of processing facilities.
Congress did not allow the Service to eliminate Saturday delivery last year and will probably not permit it this year. However, unless mail volume rebounds strongly (a longshot but not impossible), five-day delivery may be a matter of when, not if.
Alaska and Hawaii Senators Disappointed that No Field Hearings on Postal Service Five-Day Delivery Proposal Will Be Held in Their States
WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Sens. Lisa Murkowski, Mark Begich, Daniel Inouye and Daniel Akaka today expressed their disappointment that the Postal Regulatory Commission is unable to schedule field hearings in Alaska and Hawaii on a Postal Service proposal to reduce mail delivery to five days a week.
The Commission has held hearings in seven cities in the Lower 48 on the proposal. In a letter last month to Ruth Y. Goldway, Chairman of the Commission, the senators said that mail delivery is different in Alaska and Hawaii, and that information gleaned from hearings in the Lower 48 “will bear little relevance to the concerns of the people of Alaska and Hawaii.” The lawmakers had asked the Commission to hold hearings in Alaska and Hawaii.
The Commission, which is reviewing a cost savings proposal by the Postal Service that would eliminate Saturday delivery, informed the senators this week that it would not hold hearings in Alaska and Hawaii, but invited the lawmakers to testify at commission hearings in Washington, D.C., later this summer.
Senators Murkowski, Begich, Inouye, and Akaka expressed disappointment in the Commission’s decision, but the lawmakers said they will continue to engage the Commission and the Postal Service on the possible implications of five-day delivery and encouraged all interested residents and business owners to share their views with the Commission at http://www.prc.gov.
Senators ask for field hearings in Hawaii and Alaska on Postal Service proposal to reduce mail delivery to five days a week
The following is a press release from the office of of Senator Daniel Inouye:
June 17, 2010
WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senators Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii), Daniel Akaka (D-Hawaii), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Mark Begich (D-Alaska) today urged the Postal Regulatory Commission to hold field hearings in Hawaii and Alaska on a Postal Service proposal to reduce mail delivery to five days a week.
The Commission has already announced hearings on the proposal in Las Vegas, Sacramento, Dallas, Memphis, Chicago, Rapid City and Buffalo. The senators said in a letter today to Ruth Y. Goldway, Chairman of the Commission, that mail delivery is unique in Hawaii and Alaska, where residents depend on it for “basic and necessary items.”
The senators said the information gleaned from hearings on the mainland “will bear little relevance to the concerns of the people of Alaska and Hawaii. Such concerns include the likely degradation of efficient and timely delivery of medication, food, water and other necessities.”
The Commission has said that the nationwide elimination of Saturday mail delivery service is one of the most significant changes ever proposed for the Postal Service.
“It is extremely important, therefore, that you are fully informed about the impact of this proposal on our constituents and to the efficiency and effectiveness of the Postal Service on our states,” according to the senators’ letter. “Holding hearings in our states will also generate press coverage that will further inform our constituents about the pros and cons of this proposal.”
PRC: Witness List For Hearings In Chicago To Consider USPS 5-Day Mail Delivery
Witness List for the Postal Regulatory Commission Field Hearing
Monday, June 21, 1:00 p.m.
Chicago City Hall
Council Chambers, Room 201A
121 LaSalle Street
Chicago, IL
Panel 1
John Seebeck
Direct Marketing Business Director, Crate and Barrel
Northbrook, IL
Chris Luthin
Executive V.P. of Operations, Caremark Pharmacy Services
Northbrook, IL
Dan O’Brien
Director of Postage Strategy, First Data
Omaha, NE
Panel 2
Gloria Tyson
Chicago District Manager, U.S. Postal Service
Michael Winn
On behalf of R.R. Donnelley
Lancaster, PA
Lucien “Bud” Wood
Owner and President, Murray McMurray Hatchery
Webster, IA
Panel 3
Cameron Bellamy
President, Grayhair Software, Inc.
Mt. Laurel, NJ
Chris Huckle
Publisher, Cadillac News
Cadillac, MI
Jim Kitzmiller
Executive Director, Associated Mail and Parcel Centers
Rockford, IL
Other Upcoming Hearings
Wednesday, June 23, 9:00 a.m.
Journey Museum
222 New York Street
Rapid City, SD
Monday, June 28, 1:00 p.m.
Buffalo City Hall, 13th floor
Common Council Chambers
Buffalo, NY