Bill would let USPS limit Sat. mail to packages, cap closure of rural offices but scratch rural-urban parity

Committee Chairman Darrell Issa

Saturday mail could be limited to packages, newspapers could use mailboxes for Saturday delivery, and closure of rural post offices would be limited to 5 percent of annual total closures, under a postal-reform bill approved on a party-line vote Wednesday by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

"The estimated savings in cutting most Saturday delivery would be at least $2 billion," Billy House reports for the National Journal. The bill requires the Postal Service "to consider broadband penetration, cellular phone service, and the distance to closest replacement service in determining whether to close postal facilities."

The National League of Postmasters said the bill's provisions on rural post-office closures would allow the service to convert the offices to contract stations, which don't offer a full range of services, such as mailing packages. NLP President Mark Strong said the bill also "eliminates the public policy provision in the law that ensures that urban and rural Americans receive parity in mail services. Under H.R. 2748, rural citizens would inevitably become second-class citizens."

The bill says "The Postal Service shall provide effective and regular postal services to rural areas, communities, and small towns where post offices are not self-sustaining." That would replace part of a section of law that reads (emphasis added): "The Postal Service shall provide a maximum degree of effective and regular postal services to rural areas, communities, and small towns where post offices are not self-sustaining. No small post office shall be closed solely for operating at a deficit, it being the specific intent of the Congress that effective postal services be ensured to residents of both urban and rural communities."

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2013/07/25/5595937/rural-postmasters-postal-bill.html#storylink=cpy

While the House appears likely to pass the bill, the fate of postal reform is unclear. The Senate's appropriations bill for the Postal Service would require full six-day delivery, and Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.), chairman of the Senate committee that oversees the service, told The Washington Post that he plans to introduce a bill soon. Postal reform is becoming more urgent as the service rolls up billions in deficits and defaults on prepayments for retirees' health care, on which the House bill would give it a break.

The bill, introduced by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), the committee chairman, would allow the service to phase out most remaining to-the-door delivery by 2022. "Only a quarter of addresses nationally still get this service," House notes. "Delivery would shift to curbside and to neighborhood cluster boxes. The bill establishes a waiver to enable individuals with physical hardships to continue to receive door delivery. The estimated cost of that savings is more than $4 billion."

American Postal Workers Union President Cliff Guffey "complained that the revised version would prohibit postal unions and management from negotiating protections against layoffs in future contracts; increase health insurance costs; limit collective-bargaining rights; close post offices, stations, and branches; consolidate plants; and privatize operations," House reports. (Read more)