OK- enough sarcasm. But how else can you respond to the bizarre editorial in today’s “Olympian” “Tacoma-Olympian”?

Consider the second paragraph: “The battle to retain the local postmark has been waged – and lost. It’s time for South Sound residents to live with the results and make the best of an unfortunate situation.”

Can you imagine having to live with that? I mean really live with it day after day without totally losing it? CAN YOU?!?!?!

“The emotional attachment to something as artificial as a postmark is amazing.” I’ll say! What is it about people in Olympia that they seem to have this creepy attachment to something that gets sprayed on a few of their letters by an ink jet?

“When postal authorities announced consolidation plans last November, there was a fair amount of public outrage.” No mention of what the death toll was, but you can just imagine!

But just when you think it can’t get any worse, it does: “Postal officials did make one concession. They gave Olympia and Tacoma a joint postmark. The community was led to believe it would be an “Olympia-Tacoma” postmark, but it ended up being a “Tacoma-Olympia” postmark. That’s like pouring salt in the wound to postal employees who waged a valiant – albeit unsuccessful – campaign to save Olympia’s postmark.”

Bastards!!!!!

And if you don’t think that losing your postmark is the death knell for a city, consider this: “Had the city lost its postmark entirely, Olympia would have joined Annapolis, Md., and Carson City, Nev., as one of three state capitals without one.”

Notice anything missing, Vermonters? Yes, that’s right- Montpelier is SO forgotten that it doesn’t even make the list of state capitals that don’t have a postmark!

Not until the very end does the editorial get around to mentioning how the consolidation is actually working. The biggest fears the State Capital of Washington State had when this all started was that mail from the state government would be hopelessly delayed. So how’s that going?

“The biggest South Sound mail customer, of course, is the state of Washington. Consolidated Mail Services, a division of the state Department of General Administration that handles 100,000 pieces of state mail a day, has spent months preparing for the shift to Tacoma processing. So far, the planning has paid off, as it has been a smooth transition.”

Oh…

Well, never mind!

Postal promises must be kept – The Olympian The Tacoma-Olympian- Olympia Tacoma-Olympia, Washington

The rest of the story is pretty much what we’ve heard before- the APWU says shifting the work will delay the mail, and the Mayor of Canton says the city will lose its identity if it loses its postmark. (I’ll resist the urge to make a smart remark about what the “identity” of Canton, OH might consist of currently.)

The idea does sound pretty far-fetched- after all, it is all of 23 miles from Canton to Akron! Imagine that! How could they possible get mail from one city to the other (and back!) in less than a week?

Canton letters could get loopy

There are plenty of problems with the Postal Service decision to move the cancellation, postmark and sorting of the outgoing mail from Olympia to Tacoma.  But now the Postal Service has admitted that they have possible plans to sort the outgoing Olympia and Tacoma mail in Seattle, which will further increase the problems.  

Moreover, the Postal Service had plans at least a year ago to move all the outgoing mail to Seattle, yet the Postal Service did not reveal this information at the time the Olympia consolidation was announced in November of 2005. The information about the eventual sorting in Seattle was only released by the Postal Service after cross-examination in a Postal Rate Commission (PRC) case addressing the Postal Service consolidation efforts across the country (Docket #N2006-1).  

Under cross-examination from a lawyer with the Office of Consumer Advocate, a government agency of the Postal Rate Commission, a Postal Service witness acknowledged possible consolidations planned last year, but not shared with the public.  The Postal Service provided a list of 139 potential consolidations a few days later on July 25 as part of their response to the cross-examination.  The list included Olympia going to Tacoma and Tacoma going to Seattle.    

The list from last year also included a transfer of the Everett mail to Seattle and of the Yakima and Wenatchee mail to Spokane.  The Postal Service has plans to essentially consolidate and sort all of the outgoing mail in Washington in just two sites, Seattle and Spokane.  Outgoing mail is the mail that local residents give to their carrier, put in collection boxes and mail at Post Offices.  Olympia, Tacoma, and Everett handle the mail for many of the outlying communities in their respective areas.  The outgoing mail currently worked in the Olympia Plant is mail from residents in Thurston, Lewis, Mason, Grays Harbor, and Pacific counties.  

The list of 139 potential consolidations released by the Postal Service is not a complete list of the planned changes.  According to the National Association of Postal Supervisors, the Postal Service has “projected the elimination of as many as 250 mail processing centers by the time the network redesign effort is completed.”  The USPS plan is to have just a few hubs across the country to handle the outgoing mail.  It is possible that many facilities including the Olympia Plant could be closed completely.  The Postal Service has also quietly been closing smaller post offices and removing collection boxes from the streets.

The Postal Service has been very secretive about their plans because of the opposition it fears from citizens who rightfully do not want to see a reduction in mail service to their communities.  The Postal Service put all but 10 consolidations on hold pending the outcome of the Postal Rate Commission case.  By putting consolidations on hold and not identifying their future consolidation plans in detail, the Postal Service benefits by reducing the amount of public exposure and opposition it receives to their plans while the Postal Rate Commission hears the case.  If the Postal Rate Commission allows the Postal Service to delay the mail as part of the consolidation process, the Postal Service will be free to consolidate everywhere, including the places they have previously put on hold or even canceled. 

The Postal Service has plans in place to sort the Olympia and Tacoma mail in Seattle and the Yakima and Wenatchee (and probably Pasco) mail in Spokane.  However, the Postal Service did not disclose that information to the public in the beginning and instead just named the first step, which was the move of the Olympia mail to Tacoma and the Yakima mail to Pasco.  

The Postal Service has repeatedly misled the community about their plans, about the reductions in mail service, and about alleged improvements in efficiency or savings associated with the consolidations.  Despite the Postal Service attempts to act like a business, the Postal Service is still a public institution and must be open, accountable, and acting in the public interest.  The union contends that the secrecy together with the misleading and false information coming from the Postal Service is a sure sign that the consolidations will not benefit the public.   

Although a Postal Service expert witness incorrectly testified that the Olympia consolidation had already been implemented, the move of the cancellation, postmark and sorting of the outgoing mail from Olympia to Tacoma is not scheduled to be completed until the end of September.  The transfer of the Olympia mail to Tacoma should be stopped immediately until the Postal Service can be trusted to provide full and accurate information regarding their plans for the Olympia mail. 

In addition to the reduction in service associated with the consolidation, the move is so inefficient that the plans call for 15 new employees to be hired in Tacoma.  Although the new hires are part of the consolidation plan, the costs of the new employees were not included in the calculations of the costs and benefits.  The alleged savings claimed by the USPS is therefore inaccurate. 

As postal workers, we have plenty of experience in dealing with the Postal Service.  We frequently have to fight Postal Service plans that adversely affect workers and service to the community.  While the Postal Service may be big and powerful, postal workers are often able to make the Postal Service adhere to legal and contractual regulations and be a better public institution by making our case in a persistent fashion and utilizing all the options available to us.  Our national union is the most active organization fighting against the Postal Service’s consolidation plans. 

However, the union cannot win this fight alone.  Residents, businesses, consumer organizations and government representatives should do everything within their power to stop the Postal Service’s consolidation plans and the resulting reduction in mail service to the communities they represent.  Expressing opposition to the consolidation plans by contacting the Postal Rate Commission, the Postal Service, federal representatives and President George Bush would be a good start. 

For more information contact: Clint Burelson, president of the Olympia Local of the American Postal Workers Union at clintburelson@comcast.net or 360-970-2965.  A copy of the list of mail facilities considered for consolidation referred to above can be found at

http://www.prc.gov/docs/51/51193/Ans.Homework.APWU.Tr.3.566.pdf

Action Needed

Individuals, organizations, and small businesses are encouraged to write or contact the Postal Rate Commission and express their opposition to any reduction in mail service.  A sample letter could look like this:

Postal Rate Commission
901 New York Avenue, NW, Suite 200
Washington, DC 20268

Subject: Docket N2006-1 – Mail Consolidations

Dear Commissioners,

I am requesting that the Postal Rate Commission issue an advisory opinion against the Postal Service request to consolidate mail facilities and reduce service to the country.  (Additional comments are optional)

Sincerely,

Jane Citizen

Other options to contact PRC are:

Phone: 202-789-6800

FAX: 202-789-6886

Internet: “Contact Us” form at http://www.prc.gov/

For More Information

American Postal Workers Union (the national union website) at http://www.apwu.org/

Postal Mag at http://www.postalmag.com/

Postal Employee Network at http://www.postalemployeenetwork.com/

See especially Docket #N2006-1 at http://www.prc.gov/ for the Postal Rate Commission case on consolidation.

Specific information, including previous press releases providing more details regarding consolidations from the Olympia Local can be found at http://www.postalmag.com/olympia.htm. 

(Editor’s note: contributions from all points of view are welcome on the postalnews blog- contact us at postalnews@gmail.com.

“The finest cancellation service in the country”? What does that even mean? No smudges?

Postal Service Announcement to Come Monday

Update: It’s official!

The finely crafted Rockford cancellation lives! Good for the employees! Having been through a number of boneheaded, arbitrary reorganizations myself, I can sympathize with the workers who would have ended up moving to other jobs and locations.

I can’t help thinking that management missed the boat on this one, though. Its clumsy PR efforts allowed the APWU and local politicians to set the agenda and monopolize the discussion. Maybe the Rockford move made sense, and maybe it didn’t- we’ll never know now. It certainly doesn’t bode well for the future of the USPS’s network redesign plans.

The only indication that “local delivery” could be affected in any way by moving the outgoing processing comes from a local APWU official who claims that “a local resident mailing a first-class letter to another address in the same town or in a neighboring town could expect delivery to take an additional day or two”.

Really? Unfortunately, the reporter didn’t bother to ask why that would be the case. The USPS said it wouldn’t be the case, but the paper went with the union official’s assertion for it’s headline.

And the worst fear of any McAllen resident is mentioned: the plan could “replace local postmarks with the Corpus Christi postmark and delay postmarking altogether”. (What does “delay postmarking altogether” mean?!).

I’ve got no idea whether or not this particular move makes sense, but let’s be honest- this is complicated, but it ain’t rocket science. Mail moves every day between these two facilities, and I’d be willing to bet it doesn’t take two or three days to travel the 160 miles. The transportation is a known factor. So are the volumes of mail currently processed in both facilities. You don’t need a supercomputer to do the math and decide whether or not there’s at least a theoretical possibility of moving the operation.

That’s when it starts to get messy- sure, maybe you can do it, but does it make sense? Do you actually save money? Do you have any negative impacts on service? Those are the questions, among others, that the AMP study has to answer.

But that’s not something that makes a snappy newpaper headline.

As for the APWU official, he’s just doing his job. The problem is that the real impact of such a move on his members would probably not be the kind of thing that would rally public support. “Postal workers to keep jobs, may need to change reporting times!” wouldn’t really get people fired up. So instead he plays the service card.

The only one I’d let off the hook is the politician- he’s probably just clueless.

Potential Postal Service reorganization could delay local delivery
The Monitor – McAllen, Texas

According to the Associated Press, Congressman Don Manzullo, who aims “to deter the U.S. Postal Service from a move that he says would endanger the postmark of the largest city in his Illinois district, threatened Monday to hold congressional hearings if he does not prevail.”

You have to read a couple of paragraphs further to get to this: “Critics also argue Rockford could lose more than 50 jobs at its processing and distribution center if the change were to occur, and Manzullo said the delivery of outgoing Rockford mail could run days beyond the usual schedule.”

Just a thought- maybe jobs and service are the real story? And here’s another- did anyone ask the Congressman why moving the processing 60 miles would delay mail “days beyond the usual schedule.”? Thousands of post offices across the country are 60 or more miles from the processing plants that service them. (Are the roads in the Congressman’s district so bad that it takes “days” to travel 60 miles?)

And it might also be helpful if a reporter asked what exactly would happen to the 50 employees whose jobs might be “lost”. Career postal employees don’t get laid off. If their jobs are moved more than 50 miles, they are eligible for relocation benefits. If there are other vacancies closer to home, they have the option of applying for them. Neither option is necessarily going to be a pleasant transition, but either is better than being laid off.

In each case, as with all of the possible plant consolidations being discussed, there are real issues about productivity, jobs and service. But what is it about postmarks? Why is Tom Harkin worried about “the elimination of the 150 year old postmark of this proud and vibrant city”? Why is the state of Washington concerned about letters from the state capital being postmarked ‘Olympia/Tacoma’ instead of ‘Olympia’?

I’ve read all the stories, and I have to confess, it’s still a mystery to me. Consider a few facts. In the first place, virtually all governmental and commercial mail is paid for not by the use of postage stamps which need to be cancelled, but by meter stamps or permit imprints, which don’t. Meter and permit indicia usually bear the name of the post office they were entered at. So most mail from the state of Washington, and any other business in Olympia is still going to say Olympia in the indicia, regardless of where it gets processed.

Here’s another fact- the postal service operates about 38,000 post offices nationwide. Each of them can, and does, apply a local postmark to some mail. (Probably 99 percent of it on April 15, when nervous tax filers insist on actually seeing the postmark before they’ll leave). But the vast majority of stamped mail gets cancelled in one of just 200 or so processing centers across the country. Mail a letter from Sioux City and it gets postmarked “Sioux City”. Mail a letter from Ponca, or any of a hundred or more towns around Sioux City and it gets postmarked “Sioux City”. Why isn’t Tom Harkin worried about the lack of a Ponca postmark?

More to the point, who actually looks at a postmark? Virtually all of the first class mail I receive has a meter or permit imprint. The few pieces a month that I send out with a stamp affixed are usually bill payments, that get sliced open by a machine at the other end. They are not opened by spinster ladies with green eyeshades who exclaim “Why Emma look! This one’s from Sioux City! Imagine!” So if the sender never gets to see the 150 year old postmark, and the recipient is a machine, what are we really losing here?

One last point- the “150 year old Sioux City postmark” sounds like something carefully imprinted from the original hand engraved die. The reality is a little less romantic- most postmarks these days are sprayed from inkjet print heads. Hard to see how that qualifies them for the National Historic Register.

Lets get over the concern about postmarks, and start talking about the real issues!