Is the Postal Service Closing Plants Again
Robert F. Bukaty / AP
The U.S. Mail will consolidate 18 of its mail processing plants, coupling that announcement on Tuesday with plans to procure 45 new "annex" facilities that volition boost the agency'south packet delivery capacity.
The move highlights USPS' shift from traditional mail delivery to packages, a trend ongoing for years and accelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic. Information technology will also reignite a fight postal direction has avoided since 2015, when it paused its efforts to close and consolidate large numbers of processing plants.
The Mail service vowed to not lay off whatsoever employees every bit a effect of the consolidations announced Tuesday, which will exist completed past November. USPS said it will follow its labor contracts for impacted employees. The bureau is currently in the midst of offer voluntary early on retirement to much of its eligible supervisory and administrative staff and has indicated that layoffs could exist on the tabular array if an insufficient number of employees accept.
Postmaster General Louis DeJoy recently previewed the moves in his x-year business plan, which he said would let USPS to suspension even and stave off $160 billion in losses over the next decade. USPS has pledged $twoscore billion in capital investments as office of that programme to back-trail slower delivery standards for some mail, reduced hours at some postal service offices and the found closures.
In improver to the recently announced contract to begin replacing its aging vehicle fleet, the first part of that investment will become toward the annexes and the "accelerated" procurement of 138 package sorters. The Postal service expects to have the machines and facilities operational alee of the 2022 holiday season this coming wintertime, which is the agency'southward busiest period each twelvemonth. Amid the pandemic and corresponding staff shortages, legal battles over operational changes DeJoy had sought to implement shortly after taking part and unprecedented volume, USPS customers experienced significant delays in late 2022 that upended operations and spurred widespread outcry.
Bundle volume has grown 28% over the last year, USPS said, and the new equipment will enable smoother processing to meet growing e-commerce demand. Over the last decade, meanwhile, First-Form Postal service has dropped off by 23%. The 45 leased addendum facilities will be located near existing processing plants and permit USPS to better handle surges and overflow, the bureau explained.
USPS is moving forward with its facility consolidations despite a 2022 inspector general report that found USPS realized just 5% of the $1.six billion in savings it had projected from the consolidations. The agency successfully shuttered 141 plants in the kickoff phase of its plan, but pulled the plug on its second stage to close an additional 82 plants when information technology was halfway through. Lawmakers at the fourth dimension pleaded with postal direction to suspend the programme—which would have toll thousands of jobs and further reduced delivery standards—and USPS ultimately agreed with the misplaced hope it would lead to a legislative postal overhaul.
Kim Frum, a USPS spokesperson, said some employees will be reassigned from their current duties to support the new postal annexes. Those buildings volition provide additional space near existing plants, either directly next to them or a few miles abroad. She too stressed the promise to avoid layoffs applied only to this round of consolidations.
"[The] mail service moves will crave that we will allocate more than staff to support package processing given the increase in package volume and allocate fewer staff to postal service processing given the large decline in mail service," Frum said.
DeJoy told Regime Executive concluding month the consolidations would be "minimal" and "just for refinement," while some of the facilities would be repurposed. Like the smaller circular of consolidations this time effectually, the physical footprint reductions in the early 2010s—then known as "network rationalization"—were coupled with slower mail delivery windows. Under the current programme, merely about 40% of First-Class Mail will be impacted. More than mail will be delivered in a three-to-5 day window as USPS seeks to significantly reduce its reliance on air transportation.
"The Postal Service'south futurity depends on its ability to adapt to the evolving demands of our customers," DeJoy said on Tuesday. "These initiatives and investments give our employees the infrastructure and applied science they need to serve today's east-commerce marketplace reliably and efficiently."
He predicted the combination of facilities additions and subtractions would enable USPS to come across its commitment windows more than regularly. The bureau delivered less than 88% of mail service designated for three-to-five day delivery on fourth dimension in fiscal 2020, more than than 7 percentage points beneath its target.
"This optimization will atomic number 82 to more efficient and reliable performance in our plants, which in turn will enhance our ability to predictably and reliably deliver mail service to the more than than 161 million addresses we serve each day," DeJoy said.
Upon its release, DeJoy's plan received swift pushback from some Democratic lawmakers and mixed reviews from postal labor groups. Marking Dimondstein, president of the American Postal Workers Wedlock, specifically criticized the found closures, proverb any try to "further pursue the failed strategy of institute consolidation volition demand to exist addressed."
In what also promises to prove controversial, USPS appear it will resume relocating or removing "unnecessary" postal service sorting equipment to make room for more package sorters. The Postal Service sought to dismiss any criticism by noting moving and removing mail service equipment is an ongoing strategy "dating dorsum decades," merely those efforts last year came under the spotlight in the runup to the election. DeJoy ultimately vowed to break the initiative until later the election and later faced courtroom mandates to do the same, though he made articulate he would not supplant machines that had already been asunder and did non plan to cease the strategy in the long term.
"Information technology'due south no secret the Postal Service is facing financial difficulties," Frum said. "The investment for the mail moves is one slice of the 10-year plan to achieve financial sustainability and service excellence. Procuring the proper package processing equipment and facilities now will help to encounter the evolving mailing and aircraft needs of American public and business customers ahead of the 2022 holiday season."
Source: https://www.govexec.com/management/2021/04/usps-begins-new-round-facility-closures-while-also-procuring-dozens-more/173640/
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