Postal workers rally to thank Fitzpatrick
9/28/11 | Phillyburbs

Dozens of postal workers and supporters rallied in front of the office of Congressman Mike Fitzpatrick, R-8, Tuesday afternoon and thanked him for supporting a bill they say will save the country's postal service.

As one of 492 rallies nationwide scheduled for Tuesday, the rally attracted about 60 people to the parking lot of the congressman's Middletown office. Earlier in the day, the workers rallied outside the Frankford Avenue office of Congresswoman Allyson Schwartz, D-13, in Philadelphia.

Fitzpatrick and Schwartz are two of 216 co-sponsors of a bill by Rep. Stephen Lynch, D-Mass, that an American Postal Workers Union Local 7048 official said will "put the postal service back on a sound financial footing."

H.R. 1351 will allow the U.S. Postal Service to use billions of dollars from an overfunded federal retirement fund and use it to pay off a $5.5 billion debt obligation.

A 2006 law passed by Congress mandates the postal service "pre-fund" 75 years of future employee retirement benefits over 10 years - that translates to $5.5 billion annually.

The $5.5 billion is due Friday, but the Washington Post reported that a spending bill approved Monday by the Senate and likely to pass in the House this week will push the deadline to mid-November. The Washington Post also said the postal service is "set to announce up to $10 billion in losses when its fiscal year ends Friday."

Postal workers Tuesday blamed that 2006 law for the postal service's red ink, saying that the postal service has made a net profit of more than $600 million over the past four years.

Joe Quinlan, the political director for American Postal Workers Union Local 7048, said the postal service is "paying $5.5 billion to fund health insurance for people who aren't even born yet."

"There's no other government agency or private company that has that kind of obligation imposed on them," Quinlan said.

"The issue here is the survival of a public postal service," he said. "We think the postal service provides essential services to the American public. You read the Constitution and the Constitution talks about establishing a postal service. This is part of what America is."

"Congress is the one who broke this, and Congress is the one who can fix this," said Bill Stevens, a retired postal worker who lives in Bensalem.

Philadelphia resident Vince Tarducci serves as the president of APWU Local 7048.

"Mail volume has declined, there's no doubt about that," he said. "But had we not had to pay this (pre-funding), we would have been in the black, not in the red."

Fitzpatrick spoke with the postal workers before the workers marched through part of the Summit Square Shopping Center.

"Since before the founding of the republic we have relied on local carriers to deliver our mail," Fitzpatrick told the newspaper. "It is imperative that we maintain a stable and efficient national postal service not only in the interest of commerce prosperity but also national security."

The newspaper was unsuccessful in reaching Schwartz for comment. Her office did send a document that said that the postal service has been overpaying into the Civil Service Retirement System.

"For many years, the postal service has been overpaying this expense and modifying the methodology would help provide flexibility to meet other needs," the document said. "(Schwartz) will continue to fight in Congress to pass legislation to fix this problem."

The rallies across the nation were comprised of members of American Postal Workers Union, National Association of Letter Carriers, National Postal Mail Handlers Union, National Rural Letter Carriers' Association and the National Association of Postal Supervisors.

The workers also wanted to squash comments that the U.S. Postal Service, which does not receive tax money for its operations and is not seeking federal funds, was looking for "a bailout."

"We don't want a bailout, we want to get the mail out," they chanted.

Andrea Goodwin, of Bensalem, works as a letter carrier out of the Morrisville post office.

"I seriously feel like I am a civil servant. I feel like we do a service every day for the American people that nobody else could do. I don't think anybody can do it better than us," she said.

There have been several proposals to help save the postal service. Some proposals are to close thousands of post offices, eliminate Saturday delivery, close mail processing facilities and lay off 120,000 employees.