Press release:

U.S. Senator Olympia J. Snowe (R-Maine), Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, today sent a letter to John E. Potter, the Postmaster General of the United States, urging him to consider the impact on small businesses of reducing the United States Postal Service’s (USPS) delivery week from six days to five. Snowe cited the potential negative consequences such an action could have on America’s roughly 27.2 million small businesses.

“America’s small businesses depend on reliable and consistent service from the USPS, and they could suffer significant setbacks by a shortened mail delivery week, such as lost sales, order backlogs, and job cuts,” said Senator Snowe. “While I understand the Postmaster General’s desire to reduce costs, it is imperative that his actions not have a detrimental effect on consumer spending or the small businesses that make up the backbone of our economy.”

Postmaster General Potter announced the possibility of shortening the USPS’s delivery week in late January, citing his agency’s potential $6 billion deficit this fiscal year and the difficult economic climate. The United States Postal Service, which is the nation’s second-largest employer, is the only mailing service that delivers to every address in the country.

The text of the letter is below:

Mr. John E. Potter
Postmaster General and Chief Executive Officer
United States Postal Service

Dear Mr. Potter:

In light of your recent announcement that you are considering cutting postal delivery by one day per week, I am writing to request that you consider the potential harmful impact this action could have on America’s 27.2 million small businesses.

A six-day delivery week is essential to ensuring that our nation’s small businesses are able to reach their customers in an appropriate and well-timed manner. According to the United States Postal Service’s (USPS) website, on average the USPS delivers to 9 million businesses each day your trucks are operating. As Ranking Member of the U.S. Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, I am concerned that reducing your delivery week by one day may have devastating consequences for mail-order and internet-based businesses, newspapers, and the millions of small companies that utilize the USPS for timely mail delivery.

In my home state of Maine, thousands of businesses – large and small – depend on reliable and consistent service from the USPS. From retail clothing and outdoor specialist L.L. Bean to the dozens of Maine fishermen and lobstermen who ship fresh seafood across the world – and companies in between – Maine businesses simply must have access to a postal service that can deliver on a regular basis. These firms could all suffer significant setbacks by a shortened mail delivery week, from lost sales, to order backlogs, to job cuts.

While I understand your desire to slash costs and your overall concern given the tremendous economic crisis our country is facing, it is imperative that your actions not have a detrimental effect on consumer spending or the small businesses that make up the backbone of our economy. I hope that you will keep me informed of your findings as you weigh the consequences a shortened mail week would have on our country’s small firms.

Mailers Council Issues Statement on Compensation for Postmaster General

ARLINGTON, VA, March 11, 2009—Today, Mailers Council Executive Director Robert E. McLean issued the following statement in response to recent comments regarding the compensation for Postmaster General Jack Potter.

“Our members, who collectively represent more than 70% of all mail in this country, strongly support the compensation system created in 2006 for senior postal managers, including the individual who holds the office of Postmaster General of the United States. We want to state emphatically that Postmaster General Jack Potter has earned his salary and the incentive pay authorized by the Board of Governors. He is unquestionably one of the most successful individuals to hold that office in the institution’s more than 235-year history. His ability to reduce costs, and eliminate more than 100,000 positions without laying off a single employee or degrading service, is both remarkable and unprecedented.

“The current pay system for all senior postal managers was created in 2006 with congressional approval. For many years before then the Mailers Council called for creating a new system with both performance incentives and higher base pay for senior postal managers. We were, therefore, pleased that the 2006 Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act gave the postal Board of Governors such a new system—and a way to attract and retain talented managers, an even more important objective today given the Postal Service’s financial challenges.

“In 2003 we testified before the President’s Commission on the United States Postal Service about this issue. We noted that the statutory limit on the postmaster general’s salary had created a growing problem of pay compression among all management positions, all the way to front-line supervisors.

“This lack of pay differential makes it especially difficult to recruit first-line supervisors. But pay levels in general for mid-level and some higher-level management positions also made it difficult to convince young, talented managers to move their families from lower cost of living cities to higher cost of living ones, most notably to postal headquarters in the Washington, DC area. Many of the most qualified young managers turned down the opportunity for promotion because they could not accept what amounted to a substantial pay cut they would endure because of the higher cost of housing and other essentials in the nation’s capital.

“A related problem is the fact that pay for all managers, including highly-skilled technical positions, is below comparable positions in the private sector (and in foreign postal administrations). As a result, some employees left the Postal Service for private sector positions that pay significantly more in base salary and that include benefits unavailable to employees of any federal agency. Some managers have left as soon as they were retirement eligible, while others left before that date.

“Regarding Postmaster General Jack Potter, many news reports mistakenly reported that he earns more than $800,000 a year. That is untrue. PMG Potter received the following in current and deferred compensation:

§ He earns a salary of $263,575 for managing 655,000 employees, much less than his counterparts at FedEx and UPS receive for managing much smaller organizations.

§ For fiscal year 2008 he will receive deferred retirement compensation in the form of a board-approved performance-based incentive bonus of $135,041, which will be paid out in monthly increments when he retires from federal service.

§ Because PMG Potter’s salary increased, his retirement or deferred compensation automatically increases based on the federal law that outlines what postal and federal employees receive upon retirement. A total of $381,496 will be added to the Civil Service Retirement Fund. He will not receive that money now or in retirement in a single payment. Instead, these additional dollars will be factored into the calculation to determine the amount of his monthly annuity when he leaves federal service.

§ There is an additional payment of $77,347 included in the reported figure of $800,000 but that money does not go to PMG Potter. The overwhelming majority was given to the United States Postal Inspection Service to cover the cost of a security detail that he is required to use.

“Unlike his private sector counterparts, the postmaster general does not, and by law may not, receive such standard executive compensation items such as stock options, and cash bonuses paid while still an active employee.”

The Mailers Council is a coalition of corporations, nonprofit organizations, and major mailing associations. Collectively, the Council accounts for 70% of the nation’s mail volume. The Mailers Council believes that the USPS can be operated more efficiently, supports efforts aimed at lowering postal costs, and has the ultimate objective of containing postal rates without compromising service.

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Bob McLean, CAE
Executive Director
Mailers Council
2001 Jefferson Davis Highway, Suite 1004
Arlington, VA 22202-3617

Remarks of PMG Jack Potter to the National Association of Secretaries of State, portland OR, July 17, 2007

Thank you, Bill (Bradbury), for that kind introduction. I’m very happy to be here with you today for your summer meeting.

And to make it even better, how can I not feel good about a conference called “A First-Class Experience?”

That’s what we work to provide you at the Postal Service. And based on what I’ve seen so far, that’s what you’re providing here in Portland this week. So it looks like we’ve all come to the right place.

I don’t know how it looks to you, but it seems to me that this national election cycle is one of busiest and most intense I’ve ever seen. More candidates than ever – from both parties. More money raised earlier than ever. More debates. More opinion pieces. More spin and counter spin on the Sunday morning talk shows. And more babies kissed . . . in more early primary and caucus states than ever before. Read the rest of this entry »