LTS Bulletin 2

LTS Bulletin #2 - February 10, 2012

NAPS 2012 Legislative Training Seminar
Sunday, March 11 - Wednesday, March 14

Crystal Gateway Marriott, Arlington, VA

 

1.  Friday was the LTS Discounted Registration Deadline!  The fee is now $250.  

To register on-line for the LTS, click here. 
 

2.  Make Your Reservation at the Crystal Gateway Marriott

The LTS this year is returning to the comfortable and convenient Crystal Gateway Marriott in Arlington, Virginia.  
 
Make your reservation online at the Crystal Gateway Marriot by clicking here.

 

3.  NAPS 2012 Issues Agenda - What Will NAPS Take to the Hill?

When NAPS delegates head to Capitol Hill during the LTS, they will urge Congress to address two critical issues.  Both issues involve the job security and compensation of postal supervisors and managers. 

 

First, NAPS will urge Congress to enact comprehensive legislation that fixes the Postal Service’s financial crisis and creates a foundation for a modern postal system.

Second, NAPS will urge Congress to defeat legislation that requires postal employees and retirees to pay more for less retirement and health benefits, or shoulder an unfair portion of deficit reduction.

 

Here are the details:

1.  Enact Sensible Postal Reform That Restores USPS Financial Stability

Congress clearly must act to cure the problems caused by the 2006 postal law that have contributed to the Postal Service’s massive losses in recent years. The financial crisis afflicting the Postal Service was largely caused by Congress; it is up to Congress to fix it. 

 

If Congress fails to act, the Postal Service will lurch closer to insolvency.  In response, the Postal Service proposes to achieve $20 billion in cost savings by 2015, closing over 250 mail processing plants and thousands of post offices.  These actions will slow the mail, diminish the presence of the Postal Service in thousands of communities, and enlarge the likelihood of even greater financial losses.  The nation’s recovering economy will be aggravated by the loss of tens of thousands of jobs created by these processing plant and post office closures.

 

Sensible legislative action by the Congress designed to address the causes of the crisis -- not massive cutbacks in postal facilities and services -- can put the Postal Service back on its feet and help modernize its finances and operations. 

NAPS advocates postal legislative reforms that would:

 

-- Significantly reduce the USPS retiree health prefunding requirement;

-- Rightsize, not drastically downsize, the mail processing network;

-- Retain the presence of the Postal Service in many communities;

-- Preserve current First Class 1-3 day delivery standards and avoid slowing down the mail; and

-- Open the way for the Postal Service to sell non-postal products and gain new revenues in an increasingly digital world.

 

Assessments of the Senate and House postal reform bills, S. 1789 and H.R. 2309, are already available.  Begin to get educated on the issues and read them now.

The NAPS assessment of S. 1789 is here.

The NAPS assessment of H.R. 2309 is here. 

 

 

2.  Oppose Cuts in Postal Retirement and Health Benefits

Numerous proposals are pending in the Congress that would require postal employees and retirees to pay more for less in connection with their retirement and health care benefits.  These proposals, for example, would:

• Increase the amount that postal and federal contribute to their pensions
• Eliminate the defined benefit component in FERS
• Reduce the FERS minimum supplement for individuals not subject to mandatory   retirement
• Install a high-five average salary calculation for annuities, replacing the current       high-three calculation.
• Use the less generous “chained CPI” measurement to calculate retiree COLAs
• Convert the FEHBP to a “premium support system”
• Repeal use of unused sick leave for retirement

 

These proposals will destroy the value of attractive compensation packages that postal workers receive.  A key ingredient in attracting and retaining a high-quality workforce lies in providing competitive compensation, including good retirement and health care benefits.  Cutting retirement and health care benefits will undercut the productivity of the Postal Service and undermine its ability to attract and retain the best and the brightest employees. As the Postal Service increasingly seeks to do more with less, the race for talent becomes increasingly important.

 

Postal employees and retirees are willing to contribute their fair share toward deficit reduction.  But disproportionate sacrifice is not only unfair, it is wrong.  NAPS and its members vigorously oppose proposals that would balance the nation’s financial ledger on the backs of postal and federal workers and retirees.