OIG provides a Primer on Postal Reform

Steve HutkinsBlog, Featured

The USPS OIG has just released a report entitled Primer on Postal Reform. The report reviews the key provisions of the Postal Service Reform Act of 2022 (PSRA), signed into law on April 6, 2022, and “identifies potential opportunities and challenges they present for the Postal Service.” As described by the IG, the financial provisions of the PSRA “will eliminate … Read More

A New Agenda for Postal Reform

SteveBlog, Slideshow

The Postal Service is not just a business. Its purpose is to provide a service to the nation. It is “the people’s post office” — we own it, and it works for us. What could the post office do to better serve the country? Here’s an agenda.

Congress tries again: The Postal Service Reform Act of 2016

SteveStory

The House is looking at another postal reform bill, but does it have a chance of becoming law?  A lot of money has been spent lobbying Congress for legislation to fix the USPS, with not much to show for it. wo weeks ago the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform released a draft of “The Postal Service Reform Act of … Read More

Can it get much worse? The Senate tries postal reform, again

SteveBlog, Jamison Articles

BY MARK JAMISON The Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs finally took up its postal reform bill at a markup session on Wednesday, January 29.  The new S.1486 the committee took up is significantly different from the Carper-Coburn bill released last August.  The current version, aka the substitute bill or the managers’ amendment, has introduced changes to the … Read More

Postmaster General pledges no post office closures during postal reform but closes post offices anyway

adminStory

On September 19, Postmaster General Donahoe testified to the Senate Homeland Security Committee about the state of the Postal Service and the dire need for legislation.  During his testimony, the PMG made a pledge not to close post offices or processing plants while Congress debated postal reform.  It’s not a pledge the PMG is likely to keep.  In fact, he … Read More

A Commonsense Approach to Postal Reform: Congress should fix the problem it created

adminBlog

A couple of weeks ago, New York Times columnist Gail Collins wrote a piece entitled "Playing Post Office," in which see played "Let's fix the Postal Servce."  Needless to say, she didn't know what she was talking about.   But her piece got John Flattery, president of Central MA Area Local APWU motivated to write a well-informed and lucid editorial about … Read More

The Senate does postal reform: Highlights and low points of the Carper-Coburn bill

adminStory

Senators Tom Carper (D-Del.) and Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) have introduced their version of postal reform legislation, the Postal Reform Act of 2013, a.k.a. PRA and S.1486.  A summary is here, and the whole bill is here. The new bill contains several changes from the earlier Senate bill, S.1789, that should bring the House and Senate closer together and make the passage of … Read More

Carper & Coburn introduce Senate postal reform legislation

adminBlog

Senators Tom Carper (D-Del.) and Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) have introduced their version of postal reform legislation, Postal Reform Act of 2013 (S. 1486).   The whole bill is here.  Carper’s summary is here. The criticisms are already coming in: APWU, NAPUS, and CCAGW.    

Murderous Reform: A Plan to Privatize Postal Profits at Public Expense

adminStory

BY GRAY BRECHIN The National Academy of Public Administration has released a “Work-in-Progress” report entitled “Restructuring the U.S. Postal System: The Case for a Hybrid Public-Private Postal System.”  The Academy is now embarking on a study of this proposal, which would privatize a large portion of the country’s postal system. The Academy’s study is billed as an “Independent Review of a … Read More

Looking back on postal reform: Where were you in 1976?

adminStory

As the debate over postal reform shifts to the House and the rhetoric heats up a few more degrees, this might be a good time to take a step back and look at a little history.  In many ways, history is repeating itself, and a look back may give us some sense of where things are headed (or not). In … Read More

Why Postal Reform Will Fail

adminStory

BY MARK  JAMISON By any meaningful measure, whatever postal reform bill emerges from the current legislative process, it will be insufficient to staunch the flow of blood draining from the Postal Service.  More likely than not, the bill will facilitate the destruction of a national treasure by strangling the principles that support its existence.  Postal reform is going to fail … Read More

The Senate does postal reform: An overview of S.1789

adminStory

If all goes according to plan, Senate bill S.1789 will come to the floor for a vote this week, perhaps as early as Tuesday.  The “21st Century Postal Service Act of 2012" is sponsored by Senators Lieberman, Carper, Collins, and Brown.  (A good summary of the bill is here.) Though a few shades better than what Darrell Issa and the … Read More