For Immediate Release Contact: Jim Morrell
November 2, 2011 jmorrell@hdmk.org  (202) 789-4365

Mailing Industry Praises Introduction of
Bipartisan Postal Reform Bill in U.S. Senate

Washington, DC – America’s mailing industry today praised the introduction of a bipartisan and comprehensive postal reform bill in the United States Senate.  The legislation, introduced by Senators Joe Lieberman, Tom Carper, Susan Collins and Scott Brown, would introduce critical reforms to the United States Postal Service which is facing a financial crisis that could soon result in a disruption in service.

“From what we’ve seen so far, this bill is a smart and balanced approach that can shore up the Postal Service and help preserve the 8 million private sector jobs that rely on the mail,” said Art Sackler, coordinator for the Coalition for a 21st Century Postal Service, a group representing the private sector mailing industry.  “Having Senate Democrats and Republicans agree on a reform package is an essential step to getting an overhaul of the Postal Service done this year.”

The new bipartisan Senate plan unveiled today includes many provisions supported by the private sector mailing industry.  This includes a plan to return overpayments that USPS has made into the Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS) in order to help the Postal Service encourage early retirements.  The bill would also allow USPS to forego prepaying for retiree health care for one year, and then re-amortize these prepayments over the next forty years – saving the Postal Service roughly $5 billion per year.

Importantly, the Senate approach does not call for any increases in postage rates, which would further damage the Postal Service by sending more of its customers away.

“When a business has declining sales, the last thing it should do is raise prices.  Raising postage rates would only hasten the demise of the Postal Service as its customers would simply turn to other, less expensive avenues to communicate,” said Sackler.

###