More than 70 Hudson Valley unionists joined thousands of workers and their families in New York City on March 24 for a spirited rally in support of the postal workers’ campaign to retain six-day mail delivery and keep post offices and distribution centers open.
Local demonstrators filled a bus organized by the Hudson Valley Area Labor Federation and Local 137 of the National Association of Letter Carriers, with many others traveling to the city on their own. In addition to NALC, local unions and organizations represented on the bus were the American Postal Workers Union, Workforce Development Institute, and United University Professions.
The New York City action was one of scores supporting postal workers held in cities and towns across the country—in Eugene, Boston, Fresno, San Francisco, Washington, Dallas, Minneapolis, Lexington and more.
The rally, which was held on Eighth Avenue across from the James A. Farley Post Office, was addressed by postal union officers, local politicians and the president of the New York state AFL-CIO.
Protesters were packed into block-long pens—New York City’s method of treating peaceful demonstrators like potential rioters.
Early arrivals were treated to recorded music that reinforced the themes of the rally: Respect, Get Up, Stand Up, and Won’t Back Down.
Charlie Heege, president of NALC Local 36, demanded of Congress and Postmaster General Patrick Donohoe: “Do not cut Saturday delivery. Do not dismantle the Postal Service.”
George Mignosi, vice president of the NALC, reminded the crowd of the importance of postal delivery for the elderly and those in remote rural areas who have no Internet access. He pointed out the folly of the proposed cuts, which would reduce service by 17 percent for a cost savings of 3 percent.
Chants of “Donohoe must Go!” and “Five Days No Way! Six Days the Only Way!” were accompanied by the constant din of honks of support from passing motorists and by roars from the crowd, especially for Postal Service trucks.
Though Donohoe is pushing for five-day delivery in August, Congress voted to maintain six-day delivery through September.
According to Postal Service management, cutbacks are needed to make up for the loss of revenues caused by the public’s reliance on the Internet and e-mail for their communications. However, the real culprit is a congressional mandate, passed in 2006, that requires the Postal Service to pre-fund retiree health benefits for 75 years into the future. These benefits must be paid in 10 years. There is no other enterprise, public or private, that is required to pre-fund benefits in this way, and this mandate has cost the Postal Service more than $32 billion, pushing it to its debt limit and forcing it to operate in the red. (In 2005, the USPS was debt free.)
Postal workers and their allies claim that the proposed cutbacks will destroy the Postal Service and the postal unions, the largest population of unionized federal workers. Reducing mail delivery to five days would cost 80,000 jobs in the Postal Service alone. The loss of these jobs would have a ripple effect on local economies all over the country.
Despite the draconian pre-funding rule, there is considerable support for six-day delivery in Congress. The New York state delegation is almost unanimous in its support: 26 of its 27 members of Congress are co-sponsors of H.R. 30, which would retain six-day delivery. Fourteen of the 27 are co-sponsors of H.R. 630, which would overturn the pre-funding mandate.
Congressman Jerrold Nadler said: “We will protect six-day delivery service. We will protect the post office. We will protect all the jobs, and we will repeal the mandate for 75 years’ pre-funding of pensions. … We won’t let them use the pension system as an excuse to destroy unions, to destroy the federal services, to destroy your jobs. …” He called the pre-funding rule a “plot” to privatize the Postal Service by producing an “artificial crisis and an artificial deficit.” He compared the postal deficit to the federal deficits that are being used as an excuse to attempt cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.
The most moving speech of the afternoon was delivered by Victoria Pannell, a 13-year-old community activist from Harlem. She began: “Being a child, my first thought was: What about the children’s Christmas toys? Then my thoughts went deeper. How are the postal workers’ children going to college?” She expressed concern for the residents of rural areas, where poverty rates are higher than the national average and whose post offices would be the first ones targeted to close if services are cut back.
Speaking truth to power, Jonathan Smith, president of New York Metro Area Postal Union, APWU, declared: “Sometimes the fight comes down to right and wrong. And the Postal Service works. And it was working until Congress decided to steal to supply war.”
