She backs plan to reduce U.S. Postal Service losses
WASHINGTON -- U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu is backing creation of a blue-ribbon panel to examine how the U.S. Postal Service can make money by offering new services and products to help reduce its huge operating losses. Landrieu, D-La., joined Vermont's two senators, Independent Bernie Sanders and Democrat Patrick Leahy, at a news conference Monday outlining steps they believe can avert the Postal Service's plan to close 3,600 post offices, eliminate Saturday mail delivery and potentially lay off 100,000 workers.
View full sizeJoe Tedrow sorts mail at the U.S. Postal Service's mail processing center in Sioux City, Iowa in 2010. The plant closed in October 2011, and most of the 100 workers kept their jobs. Sen. Mary Landrieu is joining forces with other senators to back the creation of a blue-ribbon panel to explore how the postal service can make money and reduce its operating losses.The Postal Service, which lost $5.1 billion in 2011, could close 51 post offices in Louisiana -- including two in New Orleans, on Maestri Place and on Poland Avenue -- as well as a mail-processing center on Loyola Avenue that employs 880 people. Under pressure from Congress, the Postal Service has put off plans to implement the cuts until mid-May.
Landrieu said the cuts would not only cause a huge loss of jobs at a time when the economy is struggling but also would be a major blow to rural communities, where residents and small businesses rely on their local post offices.
Post offices, she said, could increase revenue by adding additional services, such as notary public, copying services and sale of hunting and fishing licenses. Landrieu predicted that if a commission "just asks," residents of small communities will offer up a "host of good ideas" to make additional money for their local post office.
Landrieu joined Sanders and Leahy in urging Congress to waive requirements that the Postal Service prepay billions of dollars in retirement costs years before they are needed and get reimbursed for more than $20 billion in payments already made.
"The Postal Service must be released from the onerous and unprecedented burden of being forced to put $5.5 billion every year into their future retiree health benefits fund," Sanders said. "Here's the reality: The U.S. Postal Service's future retiree health fund is extraordinarily strong today. If there are no further contributions from the post office, and if the fund simply collects the 3.5 to 4 percent interest, which it does every year, that account will be fully funded in 21 years."
The Postal Service has admitted that eliminating half of the targeted facilities, including those in New Orleans and Lafayette, would mean longer delivery times for first-class letters, doing away with the expectation of delivery within one to three days.
Longer waits for mail would worsen the erosion of business the Postal Service has suffered because of more reliance on email and competition from UPS and FedEx, Landrieu said.
A bill offered by Sen. Joseph Lieberman, I-D-Conn.; Tom Carper, D-Del.; and Susan Collins, R-Maine, would block the Postal Service from ending Saturday delivery for two years, but Sanders said it doesn't save the processing centers planned for closure. Landrieu, Sanders and Leahy are pushing to extend the ban for four years.
A House GOP bill would allow the Postal Service to act quickly to end Saturday mail delivery and close post offices and processing centers while establishing a commission that could override union agreements, reduce salaries and benefits, and lay off thousands of employees.
Landrieu called the Republican bill "extremely draconian," adding, "There's no reason for it."
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Bruce Alpert can be reached at balpert@timespicayune.com or 202.450.1406.