U.S. Postal Service officials have been up front with their contention that it is time to close some 3,700 post offices, consolidate several hundred regional processing centers and eliminate Saturday mail deliveries in an effort to stop the hemorrhaging of red ink.
We’ve heard the cries of anguish from a number of small Southeast Arkansas communities worried about the loss of the local post office. Letters were written and mailed – along with scores of emails – to congressmen and senators about the proposed closings.
Democrats and Republicans on Capitol Hill like to talk about reducing federal spending. However, the tone changes when it comes time to close a post office in a lawmaker’s district or state.
What’s really wrong here is Washington’s ham-handed management – of lawmakers insisting on less government while continuing to saddle the Postal Service with even more requirements.
Postmaster General Patrick Donahue had asked to resume a cost-cutting plan that would eliminate $22 billion from the agency’s annual costs, now about $75 billion, by 2015.
Independent reporting for Pine Bluff & Jefferson County since 1879.
Any change, from post office closings, job cuts and eliminating Saturday delivery, requires congressional approval. The Postal Service Reorganization Act of 1970 was intended to reform the mail delivery system from a place for patronage jobs to an independent agency that would be run like a business.
However, micromanaging lawmakers won’t loosen their grip.
Senators warn of concerns that resuming closures “will unnecessarily degrade the infrastructure which is one of the Postal Service’s most important assets.”
That’s just bring-home-the-bacon politics during an election year.
HR 1351, tied up in a House committee, would establish a new board of federal appointees to oversee post office closures and other cost-cutting decisions. That would add another layer of government.
Congress today is more dysfunctional than it has been since the Civil War. Democrats point a finger at Republicans. The GOP blames the Democrats.
Our constitutional system hasn’t been allowed to work. Nonpartisanship has become the norm.
The Senate-approved legislation intended to deal with the financial situation comes up short, failing to provide the Postal Service with the needed flexibility and prohibits, for at least two years, any move from six-day to five-day delivery.
The service’s Board of Governors acts like a private firm’s board of directors. And then there is the Postal Regulatory Commission, an independent agency given greater oversight authority.
Each stab at reform seems to add another layer of government.
Lawmakers in both chambers are worried about constituents’ wrath. That means procrastinating as usual.
The last thing the nation needs is another congressional crisis over something as crucial as mail delivery because the two chambers can’t agree on the seasons of the year.
The Postal Service announced Wednesday that it has abandoned plans to close thousands of postal facilities, including 186 in Arkansas. It now plans to shorten business hours at most of its rural facilities. The service estimates that 397 of its 619 postal facilities in the state will see their hours reduced between two and six hours per week over the next two years.
The Postal Service said it will seek regulatory approval and get community input, a process that could take several months – or years if Congress is involved – for the new approach that would save about $500 million annually.
The simple solution is to end the congressional meddling. Let the Postal Service run its operation, not as lawmakers see fit. If it blows up in their face, at least we’ll know whom to blame.