e-Team Report, Feb. 15, 2013

President Guffey Testifies on Postal Reform Before Senate Committee

This Wednesday, at a Senate hearing on Postal Service finances, top lawmakers voiced their commitment to passing comprehensive, bipartisan postal reform sooner rather than later.  The leaders of both the Senate and House committees with jurisdiction over the Postal Service all attested that they are “very close” to an agreement on postal reform. 

“We spent some time in the red zone,” said Rep. Elijah Cummings, Ranking Member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, in reference to nearly passing postal reform in the 112th Congress, “but America expects us to get it in the end zone.”

While the prospect of much needed postal reform is encouraging, APWU President Cliff Guffey testified before the Senate committee to remind legislators of what’s needed in a postal reform bill: end the pre-fund mandate, give USPS freedom to raise rates, and avoid harmful cuts which will permanently render USPS less useful to the American people.  “America needs its Postal Service. Businesses rely on it, and customers depend on it,” said Guffey.

“The time for action is now,” he concluded. “We will do whatever we can to help Congress and the Postal Service make these changes.” To read more about President Guffey’s testimony before the committee, please click here.

Legislation Introduced to Promote New Sources of Revenue for Postal Service

This week Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-OR), respectively, introduced S.316 and H.R. 630, two bills aimed at addressing the Postal Service's current financial woes.  DeFazio stated, “Congress must work together and pass legislation that will sustain the Postal Service, avert unnecessary closures that hurt communities and save American jobs.”  The bills are designed to stop closures of mail processing centers, prevent cuts to Saturday delivery, and rescind the unfair pre-funding mandate.  Additionally, the bills would allow the Postal Service to expand in to new sources of revenue such as notarizing documents, issuing hunting and fishing licenses, and authorizing shipping of wine and beer.

As S.316 and H.R. 620 demonstrate, it is possible to reform the Postal Service back to financial health without requiring the agency to try and cut its way out of a hole.  In the upcoming March-April 2013 edition of The American Postal Worker, APWU Legislative & Political Director Myke Reid argues that any real postal reform must include ways of maintaining and attracting new customers to USPS rather than the current approach which is aimed at reducing hours and cutting services.  Such measures only harm postal employees and diminish the agency’s market competitiveness; consequently, lawmakers’ proposals to expand postal revenue are crucial in the ongoing debate for postal reform. 

For more on S.316, please click here.

Congress’ Onerous Pre-Funding Mandate Pushes USPS from Black to Red in First Quarter

This quarter the USPS was in the black and turned a profit of $100 million, according to the agency’s first quarter financial report...  Oh nevermind!  After accounting for USPS’ pre-fund liability under the PAEA, the agency instead was put into the red with a $1.3 billion deficit.  To make up for such losses, Postmaster General Donahoe argues his series of closures and consolidation of post offices, processing and distribution centers –and most recently- the cut of Saturday mail service are necessary to keep the Postal Service afloat under the mandate to pre-fund 75 years’ worth of retiree benefits within a 10 year period.

For more on the USPS’s first quarter push into the red, please click here.

The Continuing Assault on the Federal Workforce

When it comes to the federal workforce, the Republican-led House of Representatives is up to its old tricks!  Today, the House voted to extend a pay freeze of federal employees for the third consecutive year.  Despite previously backing off from this very same proposal, House members today targeted middle-class federal workers who have already contributed more than their fair share to reduce the deficit.  As two years of pay freezes and retirement cuts have extracted over $100 billion from federal employees, today’s move by the House seems like an attempt to squeeze blood from a stone.

To read more about this assault on the federal workforce, please click here.

Obama Calls on Congress to Raise the Minimum Wage

During Tuesday’s State of the Union address, President Obama presented the case for raising the federal minimum wage to $9 and index the rate to inflation by the end of 2015 (that’s a decrease from the $9.50 minimum wage level he proposed in 2008).  “Let’s declare that in the wealthiest nation on earth, no one who works full time should have to live in poverty,” said Obama. 

According to a 2012 report by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 10.5 million Americans were among the “working poor”- those persons who spent at least 27 weeks in the labor force but whose incomes still fell below the federal poverty line.

For more on Obama’s SOTU and call for a minimum wage increase, please click here.