Postal Union Ready for 'New Direction'

from The Washington Post

By Ed O'Keefe

One of the nation's largest postal unions wants it members to do less griping and do more to make sure the U.S. Postal Service secures the changes it needs to stay afloat.

Cliff Guffey, president of the American Postal Workers Union, said his group needs to stop "acting as a grievance machine" and instead focus on lobbying Congress to enact changes to how the Postal Service pays workers and retirees.

USPS currently pays about $5 billion annually to prefund the cost of future retiree health benefits, a unique cost that postal officials and union leaders believe is an unfair financial burden on an already cash-strapped agency.

"When unions, mailers, and postal management try to rectify this misguided policy, some politicians erroneously characterize it as a 'bailout,'" Guffey wrote in a recent letter to union members.

APWU, which represents about 220,000 active and retired postal workers, and the Postal Service are negotiating a new multi-year contract for postal clerks, custodians, drivers, mechanics and administrative staffers. Guffey's letter does not signal that the union is ceding ground in the negotiations, spokeswoman Sally Davidow said Tuesday.

"We're not moving away from filing grievances, but we want to get our leaders more involved in the political process," Davidow said. "Our people need to be out there talking to politicians about these changes."

In addition to changing how USPS funds future retiree benefits, Postmaster General Patrick R. Donahoe is pushing for greater flexibility in setting delivery routes and schedules and closing unprofitable post offices -- a potential savings tactic prohibited by federal law. APWU and other unions generally oppose his proposals, believing Congress could rectify the Postal Service's perilous financial condition by allowing it to fund future health-care benefits as workers retire.

In an interview late last week, Donahoe said he appreciates that union leaders understand the need to change how USPS pays retirees.

"They are looking at the challenges that we have with the same 'Oh my goodness' that everybody else does," Donahoe said. "We've reduced headcount by 225,000 people since the year 2000. There are very few labor unions in the world that wouldn't be jumping up and down ranting and raving about that."

"They know what we're facing from a financial perspective," he added. "They know what's going on. They know what we've got on the table with them, and they have to make some decisions."

USPS Notifies Union of Bidding 'Outage'

from the APWU-National Website:

APWU Web News Article 010-2011, Jan. 27, 2011

The Postal Service has notified the APWU that posting and bidding will be disrupted while management upgrades the computerized bidding system, beginning at 12:01 p.m. CST on Friday, Jan. 28. The upgrade is expected to be completed by 6 a.m. on Monday, Jan. 31. Clerks, Letter Carriers, Rural Letter Carriers and Mail Handlers will be affected.

Postings that are scheduled to close during the upgrade period will be extended until Tuesday, 11:59 p.m. CST on Feb. 1, management wrote. The extension will not affect the date of job placements.

The Very Real Threat Of Postal Privatization:

by GlennDL

Opinions and references to privatization of the postal service comes up among postal workers from time to time. Usually in regards to some event that is related to the financial well being of the service at the national level or some questionable practice implemented at the lower levels. Events and practices such as sub-contracting, excessing, automation, re-organization etc., etc. Because the discussions are usually instigated by cynics and usually referencing singular events, or multiple events with no obvious connection, the subject is easily dismissed and relegated to the level of just a conspiracy theory. We all tend to recognize that the ideal of privatization was considered at one time, but is now just the boogie man under the bed that only a few paranoids see.

But the threat of privatization is real. The fact there is little overt discussion, and even covert discussion is hard to find, does not mean that it is not on the table. It is important to understand that a push for the privatization of government services has been a target of corporate America for the last twenty years. This is true at the national, state and local levels. State run licensing agencies [Bureau of Motor Vehicles], city run utilities, state operated toll roads, state prisons, city jails, county agencies, state and city Human Resource Departments, city golf courses, snow and trash removal, and parking meter operations to name just a few.

Why do private industries want to take over services that generate no revenues or at the most generate minimum revenues? Its quit simple, monopoly and guaranteed revenues with minimal liability. The common mistake postal employees make when they look at the threat of privatization is they assume that only the revenue generating operations could be privatized successfully. On the surface this is a commonsense conclusion, but it is wrong. We already see transportation being sub-contracted from MVS and transportation generates no revenues. For years janitorial and maintenance have been sub-contracted and they produce no revenue. How many times do we see the installation and maintenance of automation being contracted out? The appeal for private industries is not the amount of revenue the operation could generate because the profit margin on even the revenue generating operations at the post office would be too small for them. It is the monopoly and the guaranteed revenue from a government contract. It is the reduced liability from that government contract and the permanence of a government contract that appeals to them.

Those who want to believe that postal privatization isn’t a possibility need to look at the realities of how privatization comes about, how it really works and how the public is duped into accepting it.

This post is the first in a series on the subject and will be followed up by at least the three following topics:

1. The Very Real Threat Of Postal Privatization:   [This post]
2. The History of Postal Privatization [And How It Works]   [This post it has been updated [12:30pm, 2-8-2011] since its initial publication. See note at end of article.]
3. What a Privatized Postal Service Would Look Like
4. The ‘Perfect Storm’ That Threatens Us

When the subsequent topics are published the above titles will be linked to them, so bookmark/favorite this post. Or click the ‘Privatization’ link below or in the sidebar periodically.

Please feel free to comment below.

www.postal-indy.com

FYI: DBCS Clerks UPDATE

(This article was first published in the July/August 2009 issue of The American Postal Worker magazine.) Scroll to the bottom of this article for recent update from the APWU website, GlennDL.

Union Battles USPS Over Ergonomic Hazards

Greg Bell, Director
Industrial Relations

Locally filed OSHA complaints and a national Unfair Labor Practice Charge are among the actions taken by the APWU in our ongoing battle with the Postal Service over ergonomic hazards on the Delivery Bar Code Sorter (DBCS). In a March 25, 2009, letter to local presidents, the national union urged locals to file individual complaints with the Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA) for each facility that has a DBCS within the installation.

In addition, we filed an Unfair Labor Practice charge with the National Labor Relations Board on Dec. 22, 2008, and an amended charge on March 9, 2009, protesting the Postal Service’s refusal to meet and bargain in good faith about ergonomic issues revealed in an OSHA report. We also protested the Postal Service’s failure to provide information that we repeatedly have requested.

Background

In late October 2007, OSHA conducted an assessment of the DBCS operations at the Denver P&DC. OSHA’s review documented that ergonomic risks associated with the DBCS operations are still present, and that some of the findings are similar to the findings of two prior National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) Health Hazard Evaluations.

Despite the OSHA reports, the Postal Service has refused every attempt by the APWU to discuss the hazards, and continues to willfully expose postal employees to risks associated with the operation of the DBCS.

In addition to ignoring OSHA and NIOSH reports, the Postal Service ignores its own handbooks, manuals, and training programs, as well as the DBCS manufacturer’s manuals for the safe and healthful operation of the equipment. The Postal Service insists that it is making progress in reducing injuries, and that the DBCS is not a cause of Musculoskeletal Disorders (MSD).

OSHA and NIOSH, on the other hand, have documented that employees are exposed to hazards and are at risk for injuries due to improper equipment installation, including foot-print allocation; support equipment placement and organization; improper allocation of heavy volumes of mail to higher-risk sorting bins; ergonomically unsound loading- and sweeping-procedures; and are subject to various administrative deficiencies such as inadequate work-rest cycles/rotation; insufficient training (both initial and refresher), and questionable equipment-maintenance practices.

Documented Hazards

These documented problems are nothing new. In 1991 and 1992, NIOSH investigators evaluated the potential for ergonomic hazards on three types of automated mail-processing machines, one of which was the first-generation DBCS.

These types of DBCS machines have 102 stackers arranged in three tiers at heights of 22 inches, 36.5 inches and 50.25 inches above the floor. The latest- generation DBCS machines have more than 200 stackers, which are arranged in four rows, ranging in height from 21.5 inches to 56 inches.

In a 1993 report, NIOSH investigators concluded that the automated equipment used by the USPS “put employees at potential risk for low back and upper extremity musculoskeletal disorders” due to the awkward postures workers had to assume and the repetitive tasks they had to perform. The report noted in particular the design flaws at the DBCS sweeper position.

The main flaw cited in the report ( NIOSH HETA 92- 0073-2337, USPS General Mail Facility, Denver, CO, July 1991 ) was the height of the three rows of stackers. The first row is too low, and thus requires excessive trunk flexion (bending over) while sweeping mail; the third row is too high for most workers, who are unable to avoid reaching above shoulder height to sweep mail.

Due to the excessive ligament forces exerted at the knee during deep-knee flexion, the report cautioned against bending the knees as an acceptable method of sweeping the bottom row of stackers. Another risk factor noted in the report was the high number of repetitions of upper-extremity motions from sweeping 102 stacking locations from a machine capable of sorting 35,000 pieces of mail per hour.

The recommendations for DBCS operations contained in the July 1993 NIOSH report were as follows:

• Assign additional workers to the machines to help with sweeping.
• Limit the time that workers spend on the machines.
• Provide additional rest breaks for workers on these machines.
• In the long term, automate the sweeping position of the DBCS.

In March 2006, NIOSH provided the Postal Service with a re-evaluation of DBCS operations. In addition to the recommendations in the 2003 report were the following:

• Conduct periodic training and monitoring of worker activities to reinforce safe work practices that have been taught and developed at the USPS.
• Rotate workers frequently between the feeder and sweeper positions. Rotation should take place at least once per hour, but more frequent rotation such as every 30 or 50 minutes may be more beneficial.
• To ensure that the amount of mail accumulated in the stacker does not exceed desired levels, the feeder should occasionally stop loading new mail into the DBCS and instead help the sweeper.
• Encourage workers to use sound work practices such as the “Power Lift” while working on the DBCS machines, particularly at the feeder position where the wide stance and lift with the legs techniques are most applicable.
• Determine and implement a mail-processing rate of work that will help workers avoid injury. This can be established either through time-and-motion studies or by manipulating the volume of mail processed (per hour or per day) until injury rates are under control. As noted above, reducing the rate of work is the most effective administrative means of injury control when engineering controls are not implemented, such as in the case of the DBCS.

NLRB Complaint

On May 1, 2009, the NLRB issued a formal Complaint and Notice of Hearing for the Postal Service’s continued failure and refusal to provide the union with requested documents pertaining to the DBCS-7, the latest version of the machine, as well as information regarding internal reviews of OSHA’s assessment of the DBCS.

In addition to asking the Board to force the Postal Service to provide the requested documentation, the union sought injunctive relief that would require the USPS to meet to discuss these ergonomic issues. The NLRB Regional Director agreed and was prepared to go to court to force the Postal Service to meet. Faced with the threat of an injunction, the Postal Service backed down.

Since then, the Postal Service has met once, but the NRLB Regional Director issued a complaint, nonetheless, because of the “unreasonable delay” in giving the union relevant information. The Regional Director has scheduled a hearing on July 20, 2009, on the allegations in the complaint.

In the meantime, any local with a DBCS that has not yet filed an OSHA complaint should do so as soon as possible. The form necessary for filing a complaint, as well as a packet of information that must be submitted with it, is available on the Industrial Relations pages at www.apwu.org.

note: I was unable to find the forms or kit mentioned in the last paragraph, if anyone has found it please send me a link to it or a url in the ‘comments’ link below.      glenndl

UPDATE:

OSHA: DBCS Machines Pose Risk to Workers’ Health
Management ‘Lacks Understanding’ of Risks, Agency Concludes

APWU Web News Article 007-2011, Jan. 14, 2011                                        read article from APWU website

APWU Frustrated by Lack of Progress in Contract Talks

from PostalNews Blog:

“APWU President Cliff Guffey has summoned the union’s Rank and File Bargaining Advisory Committee to Washington, DC for an update on contract negotiations, but he was quick to point out that no tentative agreement has been reached and none appears imminent.

“I am increasingly frustrated by the lack of progress in contract talks,” Guffey said. The Collective Bargaining Agreement, which was set to expire on Nov. 20, 2010, has been extended, and numerous meetings and discussions have been held since then…”            read more

related:

• USPS Makes Half Billion Dollar Profit.
• Real Facts and Figures Behind Postal
• Contract Negotiation Thread