Senate Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Susan Collins (R-ME) and Senator Tom Carper (D-DE) Wednesday released a draft of their forthcoming bill to reform the U.S. Postal Service.
Meanwhile, the House measure proposed last week was being marked up.
“We genuinely appreciate the leadership of Senators Collins and Carper who have been vigorously working to craft and pass through Congress postal reform legislation this year,” said DMA president H. Robert Wientzen in a statement. “We look forward to continuing to work closely with both Senators and their staffs, the Committee on Governmental Affairs, and Members of the Senate, in order to achieve a sustainable business model for the U.S. Postal Service that will enable it to deliver reliable, affordable, and universal postal services well into the 21st century.”
“Postal reform legislation is of vital importance to the members of the DMA, the DMA Nonprofit Federation and, indeed, all corporate and nonprofit mailers,” said Wientzen. “A $900 billion dollar industry that directly employs more than nine million Americans is in jeopardy unless meaningful reforms are enacted soon.”
“On initial review, it appears that the draft includes positive provisions that would sustain the Postal Service,” added DMA spokesman Jordan Cohen.
The Senate bill contains basic features of universal service — affordable rates, frequent delivery, and convenient community access to retail postal services, according to a statement from Collins. It would also change to the rate-setting process and guarantee a higher degree of transparency.
The proposal also seeks to repeal the Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS) escrow fund provision and return the responsibility for funding CSRS pension benefits relating to the military service of postal retirees back to the Department of Treasury.
Such a move would save the USPS millions of dollars.
The Senate bill is expected to be formally introduced the next week.
According to GovExec.com, some mailing industry groups were displeased at the original House version of the bill thinking it was too weak to be effective.
“This is a horrible, horrible disappointment,” Association for Postal Commerce president Gene Del Polito was quoted as saying on the site. “We have made clear there are two things that have to be done to reform the Postal Service: Give them new methods for cost determination and give them the authority to withdraw excess costs and needless services, such as facility consolidation. There are no such provisions in the draft at all.”
