But employees who were moved from Tilco Drive to the Baltimore plant say consolidating the operations was a mistake and has come at the price of timely, efficient service.

Three former Tilco Drive workers spoke to The Frederick News-Post on the condition of anonymity. The News-Post agreed to the request because of the compelling nature of the information and its widespread implications.

via The Frederick News-Post Online – Frederick County Maryland Daily Newspaper.

via NALC | The National Association of Letter Carriers, AFL-CIO.

via Ohio Elections Boss Has Concerns Over Postal Plan | Eyewitness News 9.

But the postal service is also a victim of suffocating obligations that prevent it from even attempting to compete with other means of delivery.

There will always be a need for fast, physical delivery of communications and products. The USPS must be allowed to make the changes necessary to allow it to continue operation.

via McCook Daily Gazette: Column: McCook Daily Gazette: USPS must be allowed to change with the times.

For example, ending Saturday mail delivery, which the Postal Service estimates would save about $2.5 billion, would lead to 30,000 fewer positions. Similarly, closing and consolidating half of its mail-processing facilities would also cut 30,000 positions and save about $4 billion.

Overall, the five-year plan projects about 150,000 positions to be cut. “Luckily, we’re poised to do this in a way that hopefully would bring a soft landing for our employees,” Corbett said. That’s because 280,000 employees will be retirement-eligible or eligible for early retirement over the same period

via USPS says piecemeal approach to cost-savings plan won’t do – FederalNewsRadio.com.

via The Postal Service’s Plan: Worse Service, Higher Prices – DailyFinance.

The Postmaster General speaks to employees about planned closings

PMG Video.

To make it easier for customers to track envelopes with First Class Mail postage, the U.S. Postal Service is testing a new service called First Class Tracer at 50 retail locations near  Washington, DC, Maryland and Virginia.

via Stamps.com Blog » USPS to Test Tracking for First Class Letter Mail.

via Postal cutbacks and the voting process john diaz / Rain, snow nor elections ….

In response to the release of the list of Area Mail Processing plant closures today, Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., Chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, Rep. Dennis Ross, R-Fla., Chairman of the OGR Subcommittee on the Federal Workforce, U.S. Postal Service, and Labor Policy, and Rep. Justin Amash, R-Mich., Vice-Chairman of the OGR Subcommittee on the Federal Workforce, U.S. Postal Service, and Labor Policy offered the following statement:

Rightsizing is essential to solving the Postal Service’s financial crisis. If USPS leadership actually goes through with a realignment, instead of caving to political pressure again, it will be an acknowledgment that no budget gimmick is going to restore the Postal Service to solvency. Keeping your head in the sand and hoping for a taxpayer bailout is simply irresponsible.”

via PostCom: Postal News and Information from Around the World.

USPS attributes much of this loss to the near doubling of retiree health benefit expenses in this quarter, relative to Q1 FY 2011. Operating revenue declined by $200 million relative to Q1 FY 2011. Overall mail volume dropped 6 percent, despite significant growth in Shipping Services volume.

via Lexington Institute.

During a two-part series that aired this week, Moore reports that, in 2006, Congress passed a law requiring the Postal Service to prepay for employee health benefits 75 years in advance, costing the USPS billions of dollars. This, combined with the recession, created this dire financial situation for the USPS.

The president of Rochester, NY Branch 210 explained this manufactured crisis in layman’s terms. “[A]n employee or a child born 20 years from now, will hopefully retire in 35 years; we have to pay for their health benefits for when they retire, today,” Ken Montgomery said.

via Shrinking Service? | NALC Activist Alert.

via Rep. Gohmert releases statment on USPS decision to move ETX plants | KETK.

Senator Brown also underscored the economic impact of the plant closures, writing, “…these changes will have an enormous impact not only on hundreds of postal employees and dozens of surrounding communities, but the entire state as well. Moving forward with this plan could lead to a considerable loss of jobs and cause service delays impacting small businesses and other mail customers across the Commonwealth.”

Yesterday’s announcement from the Postal Service follows their December 2011 proposal to close the processing facility in Springfield.

Senator Brown coauthored the 21st Century Postal Service Act (S. 1789), which is a bipartisan proposal to save the Postal Service from bankruptcy. He serves as ranking member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management, which has the Postal Service within its oversight jurisdiction.

via Sen. Brown Demands Answers On USPS Proposal To Close MA Plants – Scott Brown.

Margaret Williams, spokeswoman for the Postal Inspection Service, the Postal Service’s law enforcement arm, said her agency “is sensitive to the issues that concern customers and employees surrounding some of the information that the Postal Service will be releasing. It is our mission to ensure the safety and security of the employees, customers and the mail system.

via U.S. Postal Service plans to close, consolidate 223 processing centers – The Federal Eye – The Washington Post.

Results from the week ending Feb. 17 revealed the national end-to-end scanning performance remain strong, with a performance percentage of 92.7 percent.

Mid-America District — with a performance rating of 95.9 percent — has retaken first-place over Greater South Carolina, which fell to the second position with a highly respectable performance of 95.8 percent. Arkansas continues to improve, rising from seventh place in the previous week’s standings to third. And North Florida, with a performance of 95 percent, showed the most improvement among the nation’s leading districts, rising from 22nd place to ninth.

Western Area still is in first place, with a performance of 93.6 percent. Capital Metro showed the most improvement from the previous week, rising from fifth to third place with a performance of 92.8 percent.

To view the updated scanning website on the Operations home page, employees first must obtain eAccess approval for Enterprise Data Warehouse (EDW). On the eAccess website, click the “Request Access” tab, press the “Application” radio button and enter “EDW” in the “Enter the application name” field. Select the “EDW General (All Users)” option from the menu.

Scanning reports are located in EDW within the Product Performance Reporting folder. Follow this path to view the Dashboard report: Product Performance Reporting; Shared Reports; *Dashboards; Delivering Every Scan.

via USPS News Link Story – True grit.

With the help of its lean green teams, the Postal Service last year implemented sustainability efforts that saved more than $34 million and generated $24 million in new revenue.

Behind these accomplishments were efforts by USPS to reduce energy use, water consumption, petroleum fuel consumption and landfill waste. The Postal Service also implemented conservation efforts highlighted by the Go Green Forever stamp series. USPS also recycled 215,000 tons of material, saving $14 million in landfill fees.

“Postal employees are participating in more than 400 lean green teams,” said Chief Sustainability Officer Thomas G. Day. “Motivated by our sustainability call to action, they are producing significant results in energy reduction and resource conservation.”

The lean green teams are identifying and implementing low- and no-cost sustainable practices to help the Postal Service meet the following goals by 2015:

Reduce facility energy use — 30 percent

Reduce water use — 10 percent

Reduce petroleum fuel use — 20 percent

Reduce landfill waste — 50 percent

“With more than 32,000 facilities, a presence in every community and the largest civilian fleet in the nation, we know how important our efforts are to make a positive impact on the environment,” said Day.

For more about the Postal Service’s sustainability initiatives, visit usps.com/green and the green newsroom.

via USPS News Link Story – Green teams help USPS save millions.

In a video to employees released last September, PMG Pat Donahoe first announced USPS was studying the possible closure or consolidation of more than 200 mail processing facilities.

Now, in separate videos to employees and the nation’s mailers, Donahoe has announced USPS has completed the review process for most of the studies, and is continuing to move forward with the network rationalization plan.

However, changes to the mail processing network are contingent upon adoption of proposed changes in First-Class Mail service standards. No changes will take place prior to May 15 of this year, in keeping with a moratorium on closing or consolidating postal facilities to give Congress and the Administration the opportunity to enact an alternative plan. Also, USPS is not planning any significant changes in service standards for Priority Mail, Express Mail, Standard Mail or package services.

Reinforcing a point he has made previously, the PMG says excess capacity that’s largely the result of decreases in First-Class Mail volume requires downsizing the network. “If we don’t,” he says, “we’re sitting there with billions of dollars in costs against a very inefficient network that will not help this organization in the long run.”

Donahoe acknowledges changes in the network will have an impact on employees. He says he’s in touch with USPS unions and management associations about future plans, adding it’s his goal to work closely with affected employees. “You’ve got my commitment that I’ll keep you updated,” he says. “I’ll continue these discussions on a monthly basis.”

via USPS News Link Story – Keeping employees informed.

In the video, Donahoe said that there was “too much unused capacity in the mail processing network” which required changes to reduce the financial pressures being placed on the Postal Service.  The PMG said that he will continue to honor the moratorium that was worked out with the Senate. He said the Postal Service will continue to have plant discussions with the public and will honor the contract about changes to the network.

Mr Donahoe said that the Postal Service is currently talking to union and management association leaders about incentives as part of an effort to reduce the size of the workforce. At the conclusion of the video, supervisors were instructed to notify employees if their facility was going to be consolidated or closed after the May 15, 2012 moratorium. A copy of the list of impacted offices can be found on the USPS Blue Page.

As reported on the NAPUS website last Friday (February 17, 2012), the Postal Service again confirmed that no decision on retirement incentives has been made at this time. If a decision is made on retirement incentives, details will be posted on www.LiteBlue.gov on the HR Web page at Workforce Connection.  Details will also be posted as soon as it becomes available on the NAPUS website at www.napus.org.

via NAPUS.

No doubt, many Members of Congress will be envious of the higher salaries but, presumably, it is harder to hire Postal Service executives capable of doing a good job than it is to attract people to run for Congress.

Read More.

Under the plan, nearly every state would lose a mail processing plant, according to the Postal Service list, which includes 14 in California, 12 in New York and 9 in Illinois.

via 35,000 Postal Service jobs on the chopping block – Feb. 23, 2012.

President Obama has signed into law legislation extending the sale of Breast Cancer Researchsemipostal stamps. The new law extends the life of this stamp through December 2015.

The two Breast Cancer Researchsemipostal stamp products listed in the Jan. 26, 2012 issue of the Postal Bulletin will remain on sale at Post Offices, stations and branches.

Since 1998, the sale of the semipostal stamp has generated nearly $74 million for research.

via USPS News Link Story – Three more years.

Tying the knot costs Americans $165 billion annually according to a recent New York Times article. With that kind of investment, what’s another 65 cents for a wedding stamp?“Thoughtfully worded wedding invitations printed on expensive heavy paper stock are still the norm for most couples,” Ethel Kessler, a Bethesda, MD-based art director, told the Times. Kessler has designed about 300 stamps, including five wedding stamps the Postal Service has issued since 2006.Among the findings of the 2011 American Wedding Study conducted by Brides magazine was that one in five couples are inviting their guests by email, or e-vites. But the majority still prefers sending printed invitations through the mail.“E-vites can be cumbersome,” said Peggy Post, director, Emily Post Institute. “People might not have the right email address, and even if they do, the invitation can get lost in someone’s junk email.”That’s one reason why the Postal Service released a 65-cent stamp depicting a frothy wedding cake ― a reissued, re-priced version of the 61-cent stamp introduced in 2009 ― on Jan. 20, 2012.  “It signifies a big moment in their lives,” said Post. “It’s another way of adding one more ‘wow’ factor to the wedding ― a sort of frosting on the cake that the couple worked so hard to bake.”

via USPS News Link Story – Wedding stamps still take the cake.

via USPS Plans to Close the Doors on Service; Announces Plant Closures and Consolidations – National Postal Mail Handlers Union.

A plan to eliminate the FERS social security option for workers who voluntarily retire before age 62. This would cost FERS early retirees thousands of dollars a year and probably cause many of them to work longer. The White House supports this plan.

Base annuities of people who retire in the future on their highest five-year average salary (instead of the current high-three formula). That would also trim benefits — in some cases a lot — and could force people to work longer to get the benefit they had anticipated under the high-three system.

The U.S. Postal Service has proposed setting up its own health plan. But details are short. Unknown is whether it would cover retirees, what would happen to the thousands of nonpostal workers who are in plans sponsored by postal unions and what a go-it-alone health plan would mean for its risk pool? One of the ways to reduce health-care costs is to increase the employee share of premiums and or reduce benefits. Postal unions don’t like the idea. Details to come …

via Your guide to the chamber of horrors – FederalNewsRadio.com.

http://about.usps.com/news/electronic-press-kits/our-future-network/ofn-background-faq.pdf

The Postal Service says 40 of the facilities slated for closure did not even go through an AMP study process because they were annexes or mail processing operations within “customer service facilties,” which can be closed without a study.  While no public meeting is required for these plants, the Postal Service is inviting customers to provide feedback.  There’s more information on the USPS FAQ page.

via It hits the fan: The Postal Service can’t wait to close the plants | Save the Post Office.

via Sanders: Postal Service Plan ‘Deeply Flawed’ – Newsroom: Bernie Sanders – U.S. Senator for Vermont.

The fate of the Buffalo Mail Processing Center on William Street is in the hands of lawmakers, according to Congressman Brian Higgins.

via Will Postal Jobs Be Saved? | WKBW News 7: News, Sports, Weather | Buffalo, NY | Top Stories.