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The Commission's Mandate
(This Legislative Dept. article first appeared in the March/April 2003 issue of The American Postal Worker magazine)
When the Bush administration created its Presidential Commission on the U.S. Postal Service, it raised concern about the future of the mail system and APWU members' jobs. We will follow the work of the panel, whose report is due July 31, and keep members informed about the key questions.
Will the commission recommend privatizing the Postal Service?
The commission could recommend any number of models for reinventing the Postal Service. A complete deregulation, of course, would bring an end to regular, affordable postal services in unprofitable markets, such as rural communities and many inner-city neighborhoods. Even partial privatization would undermine the Postal Service's ability to provide universal service.
We hope that the commission will heed the concerns of ordinary American postal consumers. But it does not bode well that President Bush has stacked the commission with political friends, and already is in the process of trying to privatize or contract out roughly half of the federal workforce.
Will the commission recommend changes to the letter-mail monopoly?
The panel is explicitly charged with investigating "the extent to which postal monopoly restrictions continue to advance the public interest."
Letter mail is the Postal Service's core business function. The purpose of this government- sanctioned monopoly is to achieve the economy of scale that enables our nation's massive mail system to move billions of pieces of mail per day.
Will the commission recommend changes to the universal service mandate? Will it recommend wholesale closings of small, "unprofitable" rural post offices?
It very well could. The panel is charged with considering whether the Postal Service will be able to meet its universal service obligation amid declining volumes and a rapidly expanding delivery base.
As mandated by the 1970 Postal Reorganization Act, "The Postal Service shall provide a maximum degree of effective and regular postal services to rural areas, communities, and small towns where post offices are not self-sustaining. No small post office shall be closed solely for operating at a deficit, it being the specific intent of Congress that effective postal services be insured to residents of both urban and rural communities."
But the commission is charged with examining "rigidities in cost and service" and could recommend that Congress pass a law giving the USPS the authority to close such facilities . While the Postal Service would cut overhead if that happened, many communities would lose an important part of their social and economic fabric.
Will the commission propose to end six-day delivery?
During the panel's initial hearing, USPS Chief Financial Officer Richard J. Strasser indicated that the sixth day of delivery represents a significant and disproportionate share of the Postal Service's labor costs, and the commissioners seemed open to considering whether ending Saturday delivery is politically feasible to businesses. The last proposal to end six-day delivery, in 2000, was withdrawn in the face of swift and solid Congressional opposition.
Will the commission recommend the "outsourcing" of window and other work?
Because so many USPS retail transactions are "stamps-only," the Postal Service's Transformation Plan proposes "moving simple transactions out of the post office." Alternatives include making self-service easier, offering billing and credit accounts, and pursing new retail "partnerships" with private businesses.
Will the commission recommend rolling back our collective bargaining rights?
Commissioner Richard C. Levin pointed out that the Postal Service is the only government entity subject to binding arbitration. Postmaster General John Potter suggested that the Postal Service would have more control of its costs ifs its labor relations were subject instead to the Railway Labor Act.
Under that law, bargaining often drags on for years and culminates with Congress imposing the terms, conditions, and salaries of employees through legislation.
