The Free Press, Mankato, MN

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April 23, 2012

Our View: Postal plan deserves a chance

The Free Press

— The U.S. Senate today is scheduled to take up a large and controversial bill that would shape the future of the U.S. Postal Service. But any legislation emerging from Congress will be a stop-gap measure, not a final solution.

That’s not to say congressional action isn’t important or needed. There is rare bipartisan urgency to pass legislation that would prevent the collapse of the Postal Service.  The Senate bill, laden with dozens of amendments, is co-sponsored by a Republican, Democrat and Independent. The bill — and legislation in the House — includes language that would free the Postal Service from a requirement that it pre-fund 75 years of retirement benefits for its employees in 10 years, something no other federal agency is required to do.

Some of the amendments in the Senate bill would also put a temporary moratorium on the closure of rural post offices and require the Postal Service to deliver mail in a specified amount of time.

That last requirement is important to hundreds of postal workers in Mankato who are employed at the mail processing center, which is currently on the chopping block. Postal workers believe that if Congress holds the Postal Service to meeting its current delivery goals, more mail processing centers will have to stay open.

Certainly, delivering mail in the time frame promised to customers is a necessity if the Postal Service is to remain viable. Offering slower and fewer services is not a sound business model.

To their credit, the postal workers union has offered up a plan of its own that recognizes the past model is antiquated and calls for an approach relying on growing products and service rather than slashing the Postal Service until it is starved to death. The tilt toward a more private-sector strategy recognizes the inability of the current system to survive in face of technological and competitive changes.  

 Instead of focusing solely on shrinking services, closing facilities and cutting the workforce, the plan calls for the Postal Service to use the advantages it has to add new services. The Postal Service has taken small steps in that direction, such as expanding direct mail offerings to small business customers. But there are more opportunities, such as moving into logistics and freight forwarding.

  The Postal Service does need to find more cost-savings and efficiency, including looking at things like ending Saturday delivery and delivering mail to neighborhood post boxes rather than door-to-door.

  The Postal Service is too important to businesses, individuals and the economy to allow it to dissolve without making every effort to fix it. Congress needs to provide reasonable legislation to give the Postal Service some breathing room and the Postal Service management and employees need to show they can work together to rise to the many challenges facing them.

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