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 One Beltway Center |
President's MessageOctober 28, 2009 Dear Leaguers, It’s in the Mail! Autumn is bustin’ out all over! In just one week the colors here in Northern Virginia have gone from promises of change to brilliant reds, golden oranges and dazzling yellows. We humans take hope from the signs that nature provides. We are hopeful that, with the change in season, we’ll start to see a turn in the economy, and with that, the fortunes of the Postal Service improving. Most of us are patiently awaiting some better times. The problem with waiting is that we don’t take an opportunity to participate in the change we’d like to see. As I did last year, I will do again this year and that is to urge you to prepare for your holiday mailing. It is not likely that President Obama is going to provide any stimulus package for the Postal Service, but we, the nearly 650,000 employees of the Postal Service, can provide our own stimulus toward the organization that provides us with a living. If each postal employee spends only $200 dollars on postage during the upcoming holiday season, the Postal Service would get a $130 million shot in the arm. That can be done by mailing Thanksgiving, Christmas and other holiday cards, ordering by mail and on the internet being careful to insist on having our items shipped by U.S. Mail, and by making sure that we ship our gifts through the mail, especially using Priority Mail. The best part is that cards beget cards and gifts beget gifts; American will respond in kind to our card sending and gift giving. I read that at one time you would only find Fords parked in the employee parking lot at the Ford assembly plants. Those folks knew where their paychecks came from and wanted to do whatever they could to make sure that their company stayed strong. No Toyota’s could be found in the Ford parking lot! Those of us who work for the Postal Service can do the same thing for our Service. We can use our own Service and promote our own Service or stay on the sideline watching it fade away. I’ll still laugh at the occasional online cartoon e-mail of a cow mooing, “Merry Christmas!”, but I’ll enjoy my paper in-the-mail Christmas cards even more. Mailing birthday, Christmas, sympathy, congratulations, wedding, get well and other holiday cards is an American tradition, but it is a tradition that is a result of habits. We’ve all got to get back in to the habit of using the mail. Surely e-mail is oftentimes easier for us to use, but if you want to show someone that you really care, send that greeting through the mail! National Mitigation Many Postmasters are receiving their end-of-year ratings for Pay for Performance and their numbers are very low. It is becoming more difficult for the Postal Service to convince its Postmasters and supervisors that NPA/PFP is a good thing. The recent letter from Tony Vegliante at Postal Headquarters allowed POOMs to change a manager’s rating from “non-contributor” to “contributor”. This change did nothing to affect a score for PFP. Basically, it allowed for a pat on the back (a very soft pat on the back) for a job well-done. Hmm…, this is not very satisfying to a Postmaster or supervisor who labored long and hard for the last year. We’d all have to question the potential for success of a program to work as a motivator, when it only rewards efforts in a good postal year. How will the program motivate Postmasters in a down year when there is little chance for success and during such a year when you really want them to be motivated? There is a way and it involves nothing more than fairness and it is something that the process already provides for. If a Postmaster lives in an area that is devastated by flood, hurricane, tornado or some other similar disaster outside of a Postmaster’s control that might affect his postal operation, his costs and ability to generate revenue, he or she may file for a mitigating circumstance. During the last year, the entire Postal Service underwent, along with all of America, something that is nothing less than an economic national hurricane. Entire businesses were wiped out, industries laid low and the gargantuan economic might of the United States brought to its knees. Last year when the economy was already beginning to slip and the Postal Service saw it slipping, the Postal Service went about its business establishing retail revenue budgets for every post office in the country. Generally, these budgets were established at 3 to 4 percent above the same period last year for post offices. Throughout the precipitous drop in the economy and the accompanying fall in the Postal Service’s revenues, Postmaster General Jack Potter and the rest of senior leadership consistently blamed the economy for the Postal Service’s woes; the economy over which none of them had any control! The Postal Service could do the right thing in recognizing that the revenue goals were set way too high and mitigate those numbers down by a percentage close to what the postal revenues, due to the economy, dropped this last FY. It won’t make anybody rich, but it would recognize the hard work of Postmasters and give them an increase that they more than deserve. It may also salvage a system, NPA/PFP that doesn’t seem to work anymore. And it’s better than a pat on the back! Respectfully, Charley Mapa President National League of Postmasters 703-329-4550 |
League EventsJuly 18 - July 22, 2010 National League of Postmasters Convention Town and Country |
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