Stop Delaying America’s Mail!

The four postal unions are calling for a National Day of Action on Nov. 14 to send an urgent message to Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe and the USPS Board of Governors: Stop Delaying America’s Mail!

“The Postmaster General is poised to make devastating cuts in service to the American people – cuts so severe that they will forever damage the U.S. Postal Service,” the union presidents said.

• On Jan. 5, 2015, the USPS is slated to lower “service standards” to virtually eliminate overnight delivery – including first-class mail from one address to another within the same city or town. All mail (letters, periodicals, packages) throughout the country will be delayed.
• Beginning Jan. 5, 2015, 82 Mail Processing & Distribution Centers are scheduled to close or “consolidate operations.”

“These cuts will cause hardships for customers, drive away business, cause irreparable harm to the U.S. Postal Service, and lead to massive schedule changes and reassignments for employees,” the presidents wrote.

A Flawed Strategy

“They are part of a flawed management strategy that has unnecessarily sacrificed service and failed to address the cause of the Postal Service’s manufactured financial crisis,” they said.

• More than 140 plants have closed since 2012;
• As a result, mail is delivered much later in the day, well into the evening;
• Retail work is being sent to Staples, at more than 1,500 stores throughout the country;
• Door delivery is being eliminated in most new housing developments;
• Chronic understaffing frustrates customers and slows the mail, and
• Six-day delivery is under constant threat.

“The four postal unions are joining forces to protect service, fight for our livelihoods, and defend our great national treasure, the U.S. Postal Service. We have many allies in the fight against the proposed changes, including more than half the Senate and 160 U.S. Representatives,” the presidents wrote.

The union presidents are urging their members to work together in cities and towns across the country to organize rallies or press conferences in their areas.

The call for the National Day of Action is signed by Fredric Rolando, President, National Association of Letter Carriers; Mark Dimondstein, President, American Postal Workers Union; John Hegarty, President, National Postal Mail Handlers Union, and Jeanette Dwyer, President, National Rural Letter Carriers Association.

Are the Cuts Inevitable?

The unions selected the Nov. 14 date because it coincides with the USPS Board of Governors’ last public meeting of 2014. On that day, the board will release the USPS financial reports for the fiscal year, and undoubtedly will once again bemoan “billions of dollars in losses.”

“We plan to tell the truth about the Postal Service’s financial condition,” said APWU President Mark Dimondstein. “We will point out that the USPS has earned more than $1 billion in profit from operations this year. The ‘losses’ are the result of the bogus pre-funding requirement and have nothing to do with the cost of collecting, sorting and delivering mail,” he said.

“We will tell the Postmaster General and the Board of Governors to stop using ginned up ‘losses’ as a pretext for delaying America’s mail,”  Dimondstein said. “Brothers and sisters, get ready to join your co-workers in front of your post office to help send the message!”