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U.S. Postal Service Plans To Cut Jobs

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By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID

The Associated Press

Published: March 21, 2009

Updated: 03/21/2009 12:33 am

WASHINGTON - Battered by the economy, the U.S. Postal Service is offering early retirement to 150,000 workers, cutting management and closing district offices, including one in Florida, the agency said Friday.

The Postal Service lost $2.8 billion in 2008 and is facing even larger losses this year, despite a rate increase - to 44 cents for first-class mail - scheduled to take effect May 11.

The agency said it will reduce management staff nationwide by 15 percent, with more than 1,400 processing, supervisor and management posts at 400 facilities being eliminated. An additional 150,000 postal workers will be offered early retirement.

The Postal Service will close six of its 80 district offices across the country. The Florida office that will close is in Lake Mary, which is north of Orlando in Seminole County. The others are in North Reading, Mass.; Manchester, N.H.; Edison, N.J.; Erie, Pa.; and Spokane, Wash.

Tampa Affected

It is unclear how many Tampa employees might take early retirement, but Gary Sawtelle, a Tampa-based Postal Service spokesman, said the level of service will remain high for area customers.

That's in large part because the amount of mail being sent each year is substantially declining, meaning the post office's workload is dropping as well.

"These actions are being taken because currently in the post office, with our volume of mail so low and trending lower, we are trying to basically adjust our service to that volume ... to become more efficient," he said.
Sawtelle said the functions of the Lake Mary district office will be melded into existing districts in Tampa and South Florida. He said it is too early to tell how closing that office might affect staffing in Tampa.

"It was announced today. It's really early on," he said. "This consolidation isn't going to happen overnight."

The agency also made early retirement offers in 2008, but unions discouraged members from accepting the offers and they were not widely used. The Postal Service did not say whether the new proposal will include financial incentives.

The American Postal Workers Union issued a statement Friday saying, "Retirement is a personal matter, and the union defers to the decisions of employees who meet the qualifications."

However, the union said it continues to challenge the Postal Service's authority to offer voluntary early retirement without including severance pay.

The closings are expected to take about five months.

The first quarter of the fiscal year - October through December - usually is the Postal Service's busiest time, but it still posted a loss of $384 million for the period.

Recession Didn't Help

Officials said the economic recession contributed to a 5.2 billion-piece mail volume decline compared with the same period in 2008. If there is no economic recovery, volume for the year will be down by 12 billion to 15 billion pieces of mail, the Postal Service projected.

It said that in the past year it has cut 50 million work hours, stopped construction of postal facilities, frozen executive salaries and begun selling unused facilities.

Postmaster General John Potter has even asked Congress to consider allowing the agency to cut mail delivery to five days a week to save money.

The Postal Service does not receive a taxpayer subsidy for its operations.

Tribune reporter Josh Poltilove contributed to this report.

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