June 5, 2015 | NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
NORTHWEST
LABOR
PRESS
(International Standard Serial Number 0894-444X)
Established in 1900 in Portland, Oregon as a voice of the la-
bor movement. Published on a semi-monthly basis on the
first and third Fridays of each month by the Oregon Labor
Press Publishing Co. Inc., a non-profit mutual benefit corpo-
ration owned by 20 unions and councils including the Ore-
gon AFL-CIO. Serving more than 120 union organizations in
Oregon and Southwest Washington.
Office location:
4275 NE Halsey St., Portland, Oregon
Mailing address:
P.O. Box 13150, Portland, OR 97213
Phone: (503) 288-3311
Web address:
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Editor & Manager: Michael Gutwig
Associate editor: Don McIntosh
Office manager: Cheri Rice
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Bend, Eugene mail processing centers to remain open
The U.S. Postal Service (USPS)
has taken the postal processing
centers in Bend and Eugene off
of the closure list. The process-
ing centers will remain open for
the foreseeable future.
For more than a year, postal
unions, retiree associations, ru-
ral organizations, and small
business interests have protested
the plant closures and mail de-
lay. May 14 was a national day
of action held in more than 50
cities to protest mail plant clo-
sures and layoffs. On May 15,
hundreds of postal supporters
rallied at the Eugene/Springfield
plant.
Prior to that, on May 13, Ore-
gon’s entire Congressional del-
egation met with Deputy Post-
master General Ronald Stroman
in Washington, D.C., where they
called on USPS to keep Ore-
gon’s remaining mail processing
facilities open in light of the de-
layed mail delivery times. The
mail processing plant in Salem
closed in May 2013, and a mail
processing plant in Pendleton
went down in April of this year.
The Bend facility closed its par-
cel and large letter/magazine
sorting operation in April, but
retained regular letter sorting.
Photo courtesy of Jamie Partridge
PAGE 2 |
Postal supporters rally at the Eugene/Springfield processing plant on
May 15.
“Keeping the mail processing
centers in Bend and Eugene
open is the only decision that
makes any sense,” said U.S.
Sen. Jeff Merkley in a press re-
lease. “(This) decision is a step
in the right direction, but this is-
n’t a final victory, and I’m com-
mitted to working with my col-
leagues to make sure that these
centers permanently come off of
the closure list. Mail sent from
Bend to Bend should obviously
not be shipped to Portland to be
processed. We have to make
sure that we don’t continue to
degrade our mail delivery stan-
dard and put people out of
work.”
Nearly half the nation’s
USPS mail processing and dis-
tribution centers (141) were
closed in 2012-13, and another
30 closed in April of this year.
Approximately 50 more plants
were set to close in July, includ-
ing Eugene/Springfield. Those
closures are now on hold.
As of Jan. 5, the delivery of
overnight, in-town first class
mail was eliminated nationwide.
Two-to-three day service has be-
come three-to-five day service.
According to the USPS’ own
data, the new standards are only
being met approximately 85
percent of the time (prior stan-
dards were being met 98 percent
of the time).
“Our pressure on the Post-
master General is working,”
said Jamie Partridge, a retired
Portland letter carrier and a
leader of Portland Communities
and Postal Workers United, a
group dedicated to the preserva-
tion and expansion of the public
postal service. “Growing resist-
ance to the dismantling of the
people’s postal service is bear-
ing fruit.”
Postal management says the
cuts and closures are necessary
because the USPS is losing
money. But critics say that a
2006 Congressional mandate,
which forces the U.S. Postal
Service to prefund retiree health
benefits 75 years in advance, has
created a phony financial crisis.
Although the USPS has claimed
a “loss” every year since 2006,
due primarily to the pre-fund
mandate, the postal service has
not made an actual payment to-
ward prefunding since 2011.
The USPS has generated an op-
erating profit for the last six
quarters, union officials said.