by Dan Sullivan

July 6 – The Postal Service’s Ergonomic Risk Reduction Program (EERP)is premised on a simple lie. As it says on page 2 of the slickly produced booklet promoting EERP, “The Postal Service has a long history of attention to ergonomics.”

Forget about the letter sorting machines that destroyed a generation of postal clerks’ wrists and hands.

Pay no attention to the current automated letter and flat sorting machines that are destroying another generation of workers shoulders and backs.

“The Postal Service has a long history of attention to ergonomics.”

Which is like saying George Bush has a long history of attention to the U.S. Constitution and civil liberties.

Unfortunately for Barbara Brzozowski, this long history of attention to ergonomics hasn’t made the Postal Service a very safe or secure place to work.

Last month the Buffalo, New York postal clerk was thrown out of work under the Postal Service’s Reassessment Program, a scheme to dump injured workers on the Office of Workers’ Compensation Programs (OWCP) rolls.

Her only crime appears to be getting hurt while working on one of the ergonomically unsafe flat sorting machines at the General Mail Facility in Buffalo that the USPS pays so much attention to.

Her injury was typical. She’s worked 21 years for the Postal Service and the repetitive lifting of 3^rd class tubs of mail had left her right shoulder a mess. In April 2003 she filed an OWCP injury claim. After a year of therapy and light duty work, she tried to go back to work on the flat sorting machines.

“Each time I attempted to go back to my job, though, the shoulder area would swell and become inflamed again,” she says.

So she was given a job verifying bank mail and mail for local box holders on the night shift.

“Management claimed they had nothing for me to do during the day, though they had off-the-job injured employees working days.”

Then in March 2005 the EERP Coordinator in Buffalo asked for volunteers from the limited duty section to do some light office work. Barb volunteered and got the job. Eventually she began helping out the Safety Specialist and the Medical Emergency Response Team, which shared an office with the EERP Coordinator.

Soon the work was keeping Barb busy eight hours a day.

But unknown to her, the Postal Service was already in the middle of testing a new program to dump injured workers on the OWCP rolls and have the Department of Labor train them for work outside the Postal Service.

One of the first places the Postal Service began testing what it called its Reassessment Program was in the Western New York District, where Barb worked.

She didn’t know it, but soon she would be nothing more than damaged goods to postal bosses.

In December of 2005 the local APWU notified employees that the Reassessment Program was coming to Buffalo. A few days later Barb was told by postal bosses in charge of the program to go to her doctor for an updated medical report.

Barb describes what happened next:

“In January I went to have my records updated and did not hear another word until I got a letter saying to show up for a meeting about the reassessment program. They don’t interview you at all. Nor do they contact any of your current supervisors to see where you are working or if you’re being productive.”

Barb’s meeting was on June 5, 2006. She was met by Mary McNeill, the District boss in charge of getting rid of injured workers, Manager of Distribution Operations (MDO) Mike McMann and two other bosses. She was told there was no work for her, handed some forms and told to complete them and mail them back to the Postal Service.

Barb tried to argue with them by pointing out the work she was doing and questioning them about other work that might be available in Buffalo and elsewhere. But the postal bosses had already made up their mind and weren’t much interested in what she had to say. After the meeting, the bosses confiscated her badge and marched her out of the building.

Since being shown the door, Barb has tried to use annual and sick leave while waiting for her OWCP paper work to get processed. But so far the bosses haven’t acted on her leave request.

She’s trying to use her leave after hearing that some other injured workers are still waiting for their first compensation checks more than seven weeks after being thrown out of work because the postal bosses gave them the wrong information about which forms to fill out.

“One of the other clerks sent her form in and OWCP sent her a letter back asking her why the Post Office had sent her home,” she says.

She’s not sure how many other workers injured on the job in Buffalo and outlying stations have been dumped on OWCP so far.

“There were six of us that went within the first two meetings for sure. I have heard that quite a few were also let go at the stations but that is just through stories that have trickled my way.”

Of course the Postal Service isn’t talking. Postal officials haven’t responded to requests for information under the Freedom of Information Act and all questions have been referred to the unions, which they say have been briefed on the outsourcing program.

Sue Carney is the APWU Director of Human Relations. But she doesn’t seem to know much more about the program than anyone else outside the Postal Service.

Right now the Reassessment Program is being tested in the Western New York Region and the Pacific Area. Final approval to go nationwide with the program is expected soon.

“When it is approved, they do not expect a rapid expansion,” Carney says. “It is being estimated that two to three postal districts per year will be reassessed.”

In a recent email she wrote, “We are still raising concerns/pointing to violations with USPS as it relates to this program and our Step 4 dispute. Once I am comfortable that we have all relative information and that it is accurate I anticipate providing a summary report to the local/state presidents and national field officers.”

In the meantime, more and more injured workers like Barb Brzozowski, whose only crime was getting hurt at work, are caught up in the dragnet as managers use the Reassessment Program to quietly sweep away their obligations to injured postal workers.

by Dan Sullivan

The piece of vinyl siding was hidden beneath 3 inches of snow when Mike Vinci accidentally found it while delivering mail in Caledonia, NY.

It was like stepping on a sheet of ice.

“My feet went straight up in the air,” he remembers. ” Like an idiot, I hung onto the mail and landed on my elbow.”

Mike finished his mail route that day. But the pain wouldn’t go away.

“I worked for almost a year with shoulder and neck pain, not knowing I had damaged two discs in my neck and partially tore my Achilles tendon in my left ankle.

“I went out of work in February of 1992. It took eight months to even get an OWCP claim number and my first comp check. I had $75 to my name.”

Mike had more than money problems.

It turns out he needed surgeries to repair his ankle and neck. But, like the wheels of justice, the bureaucracy moves slowly. After his ankle surgery, it took another three years to get approval from the Office of Workers’ Compensation Programs (OWCP) for surgery to fuse his 4^th and 5^th and 6^th and 7^th cervical discs.

His days as a letter carrier were over.

But the Postal Service has always provided work for employees hurt on the job. So when he recovered from his surgeries, Mike was given a position as a part-time flexible clerk at the nearby Geneseo post office. Eventually he worked his way into a regular position.

His work involved the usual clerks’ duties, sorting and distributing letters and flats, clearing carriers and handling accountable mail. Mike has done everything, in fact, except work the window, where the college kids often bring in large parcels too heavy for him to lift because of his medical restrictions.

The story would end here, if the Postal Service hadn’t come up with a scheme to get rid of injured workers like Mike.

Called the Reassessment Program, the plan is being tested in the Western New York District and a couple other areas of the country. The purpose of the program is to cull injured workers from the payroll by dumping them on Workers’ Compensation and then retraining them for private sector jobs.

Mike got his walking papers on May 24, when it took five postal bosses coming down from the Western New York District Office in Buffalo to tell him he was no longer needed.

“A mail carrier had to come in off the street to take over my duties delivering all of the guaranteed overnight mail so that I could attend the meeting,” Mike says.

“They took my badge and walked me out the door. It was 2:00 p.m. They don’t even let you say goodbye to your friends.”

The Geneseo Postmaster, Tammy Kelley, disagreed with the big shots who said there wasn’t any work for Mike.

But what did she know? She was only looking out for Geneseo and wasn’t able to see the big picture.

‘Tammy insisted to them that, not only was I doing a great job and an asset to the office, but the work was there for me to do and had not changed. She also emphasized that I was included in the office budget hours, compiled by them, and that the office had made budget last year and is continuing to do so.”

For obvious reasons, Postmaster Kelley was reluctant to speak about Mike’s situation.

“I can’t really say too much, except this is all new. It’s beyond me. It involves staffing decisions by higher-ups,” the Postmaster says.

But she wasn’t reluctant to praise Mike’s work ethic.

“Oh, Mike was an excellent worker. I can tell you that.”

The bosses at postal headquarters who came up with the Reassessment Program have been mum about the scheme, referring all questions to the American Postal Workers Union, which they say has been briefed on the outsourcing program.

According to APWU Human Relations Director Sue Carney, the Postal Service claims it wants all limited duty and rehabilitation jobs to consist of “necessary work,” not make-work assignments.

So it seems like an obvious question to ask: Why dump Mike Vinci back on Workers’ Compensation when the Geneseo Postmaster has plenty of real work for him to do?

The postal big shot who apparently decided that Mike wasn’t needed at the Geneseo post office is Mary McNeill. She has an important title: Western New York District Manager of Injury Compensation.

Mary wasn’t in her office when I called to ask why Mike was put off the clock and unceremoniously shown the door. Or why it took 5 postal bosses to deliver the news. The person who answered her phone said she was on the road doing reassessment interviews.

I have to assume she must be quite busy trying to help other injured workers, because she hasn’t returned my call.

Mike is now 54 years old and in 11 months he’ll be eligible to retire. Until then he’s going to fight to get his job back.

He’s written his Congressman and filed a grievance with the American Postal Workers Union over his dismissal.

As you can imagine, he doesn’t have much good to say about the Reassessment Program and the bureaucrats in charge of it. But he’s grateful to Geneseo Postmaster Tammy Kelley for “being truthful and maybe jeopardizing her job” for him.

And he has this bit of advice for other postal workers who think it can’t happen to them:

“Even the people who aren’t injured should be against this program because anyone can get hurt at work.

“If it can happen to me, it can happen to anyone.”

Contact Dan Sullivan at dan_sullivan9026@hotmail.com.