Under orders from his board, Postmaster General Pat Donahoe is gamely trying to reopen pay talks with employee organizations after the collapse of efforts to end Saturday mail delivery.
Good luck with that.
The U.S. Postal Service’s “untenable” financial position “demands urgent action to ensure the near-term viability of our great institution,” Donahoe said in a Tuesday letter to Louis Atkins, president of the National Association of Postal Supervisors. (NAPS provided the letter to FedLine with permission to post it online.)
“In light of these extraordinary circumstances, I request your cooperation in reopening consultations concerning the pay and benefits of the dedicated employees you represent,” Donahoe said in the letter. “I fully understand the significance of this request and would not make it; however, the financial challenges confronting the organization and all who depend upon its very survival make it necessary.”
The USPS board of governors told Donahoe last week to take that unprecedented step after dropping plans to go to five-day-a-week mail delivery this August. In a statement, the board said its goal is to lower total workforce costs and find other ways to make economies. Similar letters went out this week to the two postmaster groups and the Postal Service’s four unions.
“What I‘d like to do is sit down–before we do anything–as a group and have a session where we kick around some ideas,” Donahoe said at a Wednesday congressional hearing. “There may be some opportunities in there we should look at.”
But after years of cutbacks and downsizing, employee groups aren’t feeling very receptive. At least three of the four postal unions are so far objecting to a return to the bargaining table. And NAPS’ executive board has already decided that reopening pay consultations is not in members’ best interest, the association said yesterday in a politely worded news release. Last year’s round resulted in a third straight year without a salary increase for executive and administrative schedule (EAS) employees, the release said, adding that supervisors, managers and postmasters must pay more for health insurance.
Finally, hiring freezes stemming from the Postal Service’s financial crisis have left the mail carrier understaffed by as many as 5,000 supervisory and managerial positions, the release says. “Our members have performed admirably under these trying conditions, moving the mail every day throughout the country and have given back more than their fair share.”
5 Comments
Is there anyone in this universe who was surprised at the unions response, besides the dolts on the PRC?
How big we’re the pay cuts and benefit reductions that the executives in Washington took ?
They are taking my job from me and I still do not know were I will end up! Management had the chance to negotiate a better deal two years ago. Instead they signed a contract with APWU and a week later Congressman Issa had a bill to throw out my contract, cut my pay and benefits. Days after Issa’s bill Donahoe put out a statement with the exact same give backs. Now they want my cooperation. That is not going to happen!
It is obvious these 2 clowns conspired to end the unions. These 2 should both be removed from their jobs. If they want me to retire, allow me to take my full benefits that I have worked the last 35 years to earn. I will not be old enough to collect those benefits for 2 more years.
If the Postal Service needs more money, they need to take it from the largest bulk mailers that have been subsidized for years by 1st class mail. With the decline in 1st class letters, bulk mailers are just going to have to pay their own way.
These mailers send reps to the Postal Board of Governors meetings, the Postal Regulatory Commission meetings and lobbyists to congress. Where did that money come from? The savings from cheap postage!
Don’t allow these mailers to rip off the American public any more, let them pay their own way!
After previous ‘Pay consultations’ (which were not consultations at all) how can USPS expect cooperation from their management organizations here?
It amazes me that the USPS, in upper management’s self-serving approach, will not listen to it’s professional managers in running the day-to-day business, and yet has the nerve to ask for consultation in an arena that historically has shown NO INPUT WANTED from NAPS, League, & NAPUS… Does Donahoe seriously expect any takers?!?
Management is currently using the new supplemental Postal Support Employees (PSE’s) negotiated in the APWU contract – as supervisor’s (204b’s) – but cheating them out of higher level EAS-17 pay that they provide career employees who accept these temporary details. So basically we have a bunch of temporary 204b/PSE supervisors who are getting paid the at the workforce pay grade – PS-06.
I’m not a big supporter of using PSE as supervisor’s, but not paying them properly is just plain exploitation – PERIOD! Donahoe and the BOG should be ashamed of themselves. Why dont they do their job at the PS pay rate – since they think it’s ok to do that to a PSE.