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GAO Criticizes USPS Network Consolidation Strategy
But Study Misses the Mark, APWU President Says
APWU Web News Article #22-05, May 18, 2005
The U.S. Postal Service plan for consolidating its mail processing and distribution network lacks “clarity, criteria, and accountability,” a recent report by the Government Accountability Office concluded.
The agency’s study, conducted at the request of members of the House Government Reform Committee, also found that the USPS has failed to clearly communicate its network realignment plans to the mailing industry, employee groups, and Congress.
“The Service’s strategy for realigning has not been clear because the Service has outlined seemingly different strategies over the past three years,” the report says. “ While the Service has announced various plans and strategies, including a modeling effort and an attempt to get more uniformity in its infrastructure, it recently announced that it is pursuing an evolutionary strategy — that will respond to opportunities as they arise — and has provided little information about any of these efforts.”
But APWU President William Burrus said the GAO analysis is flawed. “The report fails to consider that service to the American public is the primary mission of the USPS network. They operated on the sole premise that if mail volume is stagnant, the network should be reduced.”
“In doing so, GAO neglected to consider the growth of the USPS delivery obligation — by 1.8 million new addresses each year. Service to the American public didn’t enter into GAO’s equation,” Burrus said.
“GAO’s failure to consider expansion of the Postal Service’s delivery obligation stands in stark contrast to their support for postal reform,” Burrus observed. “When GAO officials advocate postal reform, they always cite USPS’ growing delivery responsibilities as justification.”
“Network realignment is a euphemism for reduction — reduction in plants and post offices,” the union president continued. “This has long been an objective of the major mailers, whose goal is reducing their postage costs. With this report, GAO is echoing the mailers’ complaints.”
GAO’s report asserts that a repositioning of plants and mail transportation centers is necessary due to declining mail volume, improved productivity, and shifting population trends.
The GAO study, “The Service’s Strategy for Realigning Its Mail Processing Infrastructure Lacks, Clarity, Criteria and Accountability” [PDF] (GAO-50-261), dated April 2005, was conducted at the request of Reps. John McHugh (R-NY) and Danny Davis (D-IL), members of the House Government Reform Committee and sponsors of the postal reform legislation (H.R. 22) that was recently cleared by the panel. The congressmen released the report May 9.
