PostalReporter News Blog Will Be Down For a Few Hours
PostalReporternews.com will be making some changes to the blog so hold all of your comments until tomorrow morning.
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Dead Tree Edition Blog Not Dead Yet
The Dead Tree Edition blog is experiencing technical difficulties so readers will find the message from Google stating “The blog you were looking for was not found.” Here is the message Dead Tree Edition sent out yesterday:
“For all of you who have been kind enough to link to my blog, Dead Tree Edition (http://deadtreeedition.blogspot.com/), I wanted to let you know that it’s been attacked by Google’s robots and, as of this morning, is out of service. But it’s not dead, it’s only resting. Here’s the explanation from Google, which owns Blogspot: “The disabling is a result of our automated classification system marking it as spam. Because this system is automated there will necessarily be some false positives, though we’re continually working on improving our algorithms to avoid these. If your blog is not a spam blog, then it was one of the false positives, and we apologize.”’
I have submitted evidence to Googleworld that I am indeed a human being, and I have appealed to the Google bots to restore Dead Tree Edition. From what I have read so far from other bloggers, it may take several days, or more, for that to happen. I suspect the problem is the result of a few spammy comments that were submitted in the past few days that I had not had time to remove. It would have been nice if Google had notified me of the problem or disabled the comments. It would have been nice if Google had notified me when it disabled the blog. It would be nice if I had access to the offending comments so that I could remove them. It would have been nice if Google had not chosen a period of extremely high traffic that resulted from several of you linking to my new article on the Flats Sequencing System. And it would be nice if people going to the site got more of an explanation than “The blog you were looking for was not found.” But such is life in the Googlopoly.
I would appreciate anything you can do to get the word out to your readers. I will notify you when the bots have smiled on Dead Tree Edition and made it un-dead.”
Victory: FERS Sick-Leave Credit Becomes Law
APWU News
President Obama signed legislation Oct. 28 that will allow postal and federal workers who retire under the Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS) to receive credit for sick leave when they retire. The new benefit was included among a number of pay and retirement provisions in a compromise version of the 2010 Defense Authorization bill.
The law includes a provision long sought by the APWU and other organizations representing federal employees, which allows FERS-covered workers to receive a 50 percent credit for unused sick leave until Dec. 31, 2013. Starting on Jan. 1, 2014, they will receive full credit. Employees covered by the Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS) already receive credit for sick leave when they retire.
“This is a great accomplishment for APWU and other organizations representing federal employees,” said APWU Legislative and Political Director Myke Reid. “We have always believed sick-leave credit for FERS employees is a matter of basic fairness.”
The FERS sick-leave provision was originally introduced in the House of Representatives as a stand-aone bill by Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA), but the bill suffered numerous setbacks.
The Defense bill — including the FERS benefit — was passed by the House on June 25, by a vote of 389-22. But a month later an amendment granting the benefit was withdrawn at the insistence of Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK), who threatened to filibuster. “Until this amendment is withdrawn, I will stay here, or I will have a colleague stay here, and we will talk about how this country is out of control in its spending,” he said. “We’ve institutionalized sick leave. We’ve made it an entitlement.”
Sen. Daniel Akaka (D-HI), the main sponsor of the amendment, agreed to withdraw it, but continued to defend the provision, saying, “This amendment will ensure that all federal employees are treated the same.”
On Oct. 7, 10 weeks after he withdrew the provision, Akaka was instrumental in getting it through a House-Senate conference committee, Reid said.
The House adopted the Defense Authorization bill — including the FERS sick-leave credit on Oct. 8, and the Senate followed suit on Oct. 22.
Rep. Edolphus Towns, (D-NY), the chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, and Rep. Stephen Lynch (D-MA), chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Federal Workforce Subcommittee, were also key to the effort to convince conferees to include the sick-leave credit and other workforce provisions.
The compromise legislation also includes a provision that would make it easier for federal agencies, including the Postal Service, to rehire retirees (for a limited time) without forcing them to take a cut in their annuity checks. “This provision will help eliminate the USPS objections to APWU’s efforts to return postal retirees to employment,” Burrus said. “If the bill is passed, the union will renew our discussion with management on this issue.”
The bill also includes:
- A provision that would allow employees who choose to work part-time toward the end of their careers to use a higher salary figure in calculations for how the reduced work factors into their retirement benefits.
- A provision that would move workers in Hawaii, Alaska, the Virgin Islands and other U.S. territories from cost-of-living adjustments to a locality-pay system. [The territorial COLAs, as they are known, would be applied differently to postal employees than to other federal workers. The T-COLAs would not be taxed and would not be credited towards retirement; for other federal employees these earnings would be taxed and would be credited toward retirement.]
- A provision that would allow FERS employees who left and then returned to government service to redeposit savings in the retirement system and earn credit for years they had previously worked.
USPS ‘Incentive’ Program Results In 19,000 APWU-Craft Retirements
Approximately 19,000 USPS employees in APWU-represented crafts will retire or separate from the Postal Service before Dec. 1 and receive a $15,000 incentive under an agreement negotiated by the union.
A Memorandum of Understanding creating the incentive program was signed on Aug. 24. “This agreement achieved a long-standing objective of the APWU,” said union President William Burrus.
The agreement applied to non-probationary career postal employees in the APWU bargaining unit; the incentive was offered to eligible employees who terminated their service through Optional (Regular) Retirement, Voluntary Early Retirement, or separation. (Eligible PTR and PTF employees received offers of proportional percentages of the incentive.)
It included employees in the Clerk Craft, Maintenance Craft, Motor Vehicle Services Craft, mail equipment shops, material distribution centers, and occupational health nurses, with some exceptions and limitations.
Not covered by the agreement were employees who were issued a notice of discharge on or before Aug. 24; MPE 9s, ET 10s, and ET 11s who could not be replaced without training; Operating Services employees; employees in the Accounting Services section of the IT/ASC bargaining unit, probationary employees, and Transitional Employees.
Depending on whether they were eligible for early or regular retirement, employees were required to apply for retirement by Sept. 25 or express interest by that date. Some employees can revoke their decisions until the effective date of retirement, so the final tally could be significantly lower than the 19,738 reported by the USPS.
According to the unofficial numbers as of Sept. 25, approximately 3,000 Mail Handlers, who received an offer virtually identical to the APWU-negotiated agreement, also took part in the USPS retirement-incentive program
Requests Optional VER Separations Total
Week ending Sept. 4 10,164 0 111 10,275
Week ending Sept. 11 3,387 1,056 38 4,481
Week ending Sept. 18 1,913 1,073 107 3,093
Week ending Sept. 25 940 667 282 1,889
TOTAL 16,404 2,796 538 19,738*
* All figures are unofficial. Because some employees can revoke their decisions until the effective date of retirement, the final tally may be lower. source: APWU
EEOC Proposes Broader Definition of Disability
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) issued a Federal Register Notice proposing to revise its Americans with Disability Act (ADA) regulations and accompanying interpretive guidance in order to implement the ADA Amendments Act of 2008, Pub. L. No. 110?325. Comments on the proposed regulations, 74 Fed. Reg. 48431-48450, are due no later than November 23, 2009. The EEOC described the nature of the revised regulations as follows:
Pursuant to the 2008 amendments, the definition of disability under the ADA, 42 U.S.C. 12101, et seq., shall be construed in favor of broad coverage to the maximum extent permitted by the terms of the ADA as amended, and the determination of whether an individual has a disability should not demand extensive analysis. The Amendments Act makes important changes to the definition of the term “disability” by rejecting the holdings in several Supreme Court decisions and portions of EEOC’s ADA regulations. The effect of these changes is to make it easier for an individual seeking protection under the ADA to establish that he or she has a disability within the meaning of the ADA. . . . .
The Amendments Act retains the ADA’s basic definition of “disability” as an impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities, a record of such an impairment, or being regarded as having such an impairment. However, it changes the way that these statutory terms should be interpreted in several ways, therefore necessitating revision of the existing regulations and interpretive guidance contained in the accompanying “Appendix to Part 1630—Interpretive Guidance on Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act,” which are published at 29 CFR part 1630.
Consistent with the provisions of the Amendments Act and Congress’s expressed expectation therein, the proposed rule:
—Provides that the definition of “disability” shall be interpreted broadly;
—Revises that portion of the regulations defining the term “substantially limits” as directed in the Amendments Act by providing that a limitation need not “significantly” or “severely” restrict a major life activity in order to meet the standard, and by deleting reference to the terms “condition, manner, or duration” under which a major life activity is performed, in order to effectuate Congress’s clear instruction that “substantially limits” is not to be misconstrued to require the “level of limitation, and the intensity of focus” applied by the Supreme Court in Toyota Motor Mfg., Ky v. Williams, 534 U.S. 134 [sic: correct citation is 534 U.S. 184] (2002) (2008 Senate Managers’ Statement at 6);
—Expands the definition of “major life activities” through two nonexhaustive lists:
—The first list includes activities such as caring for oneself, performing manual tasks, seeing, hearing, eating, sleeping, walking, standing, sitting, reaching, lifting, bending, speaking, breathing, learning, reading, concentrating, thinking, communicating, interacting with others, and working, some of which the EEOC previously identified in regulations and sub-regulatory guidance, and some of which Congress additionally included in the Amendments Act;
—The second list includes major bodily functions, such as functions of the immune system, special sense organs, and skin; normal cell growth; and digestive, genitourinary, bowel, bladder, neurological, brain, respiratory, circulatory, cardiovascular, endocrine, hemic, lymphatic, musculoskeletal, and reproductive functions, many of which were included by Congress in the Amendments Act, and some of which have been added by the Commission as further illustrative examples;
—Provides that mitigating measures other than “ordinary eyeglasses or contact lenses” shall not be considered in assessing whether an individual has a “disability”;
—Provides that an impairment that is episodic or in remission is a disability if it would substantially limit a major life activity when active;
—Provides that the definition of “regarded as” is changed so that it no longer requires a showing that the employer perceived the individual to be substantially limited in a major life activity, and instead provides that an applicant or employee who is subjected to an action prohibited by the ADA (e.g., failure to hire, denial of promotion, or termination) because of an actual or perceived impairment will meet the “regarded as” definition of disability, unless the impairment is both transitory and minor;
—The proposed rule provides that actions based on an impairment include actions based on symptoms of an impairment, and the Commission invites public comment on this point;
—Provides that individuals covered only under the “regarded as” prong are not entitled to reasonable accommodation; and,
—Provides that qualification standards,employment tests, or other selection criteria based on an individual’s uncorrected vision shall not be used unless shown to be job-related for the position in question and consistent with business necessity.
Blog Maintenance
This blog will be down for maintenance later today and lasting for at least one or two days. So if you have any ongoing conversations please hold your comments for now.
Thanks for your patience
FYI: Links On Blog Are Working Again
All of the links on the blog are working again. Some links on the postalreporter.com website may not work as I continue to make a few changes and adjustments.
Postal Supervisors Prez Disappointed In Obama's Comments on USPS
From National Association of Postal Supervisors:
On August 14, 2009, President Ted Keating sent the attached letter to President Barack Obama to voice the disappointment of all the members of NAPS with the negative comments that the president recently made about the United States Postal Service.
It was particularly disheartening to have to hear the president’s negative comments while NAPS members are all working so hard to assist the Postal Service in reducing costs and at the same time are being subjected to the loss of positions and are being uprooted from their jobs. NAPS could not let the president’s comments go unchallenged.
Excerpts of the NAPS President Keating Letter to President Obama:
First of all, the Postal Service, UPS and FedEx are all currently struggling with the effects of the economy, and your negative references to the Postal Service without knowledge of the facts was a disservice not only to the members of our organization, but to all postal employees.
The Postal Service has reacted swiftly to the problems of the current economy by the reduction of 29 million workhours over the same period last year. The Postal Service has also eliminated the use of eight million hours of overtime over the same periods last year. Postal Service revenues is down nearly 17% over last year and FedEx revenue is more then 20% lower than last year. We are all feeling the same effects.
These three delivery companies have experienced downturns in business through no fault of their own. In the Postal Service we are now completing the reductions of over 3,000 management positions. With all of these efforts underway within the Postal Service community, it was kick to the chest to have you take a shot at a group of federal employees who are working hard every day to support this country.
USPS Reports Financial Loss For May 2009
The U.S. Postal Service filed its May 2009 (unaudited) preliminary financial report today with the Postal Regulatory Commission. USPS reported a net income loss of $677 million (April 2009 was $385 million). The year-to-date deficit currently stands at approximately $3.4 billion. Mail volume was down across all classes with an overall total decrease of 19.9%. The Postal Service continues to reduce its workhours with Mail Processing and Customer Services/Retail showing the highest reduction of 16.1% and 16.6% respectively. See chart below (click on picture for larger view) or see full report (pdf) here:
