U.S. Postal Service’s 10-year consolidation plan under scrutiny

By Buffy Pollock, Rogue Valley Times

United States Postal Service officials claim they have resolved “early transitional issues” for Southern Oregon as part of an ongoing consolidation, but state and national leaders, as well as postal customers, say little has improved.

The region’s postal workers have told the Rogue Valley Times that large amounts of outgoing mail continue to be left overnight in post offices — a reduction in mail truck routes has meant less available space in the remaining trucks for mail pickup — and mail delivery continues to see delays.

The changes stem from Postmaster General Louis DeJoy’s 10-year “Delivering for America” plan, which seeks to consolidate processing and distribution operations nationwide. Postal officials say the consolidation will bring “financial sustainability and service excellence.”

But postal customers, regionally and nationally, have reported concerns ranging from delayed time-sensitive parcels, such as prescription medicines, to potential disruptions in mail-in voting during election season.

In Southern Oregon, delivery delays began in late February after portions of postal operations at facilities in Medford and Eugene were moved to a regional hub in Portland.

Bipartisan opposition to consolidation

U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley and U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, two Oregon Democrats, announced in late April a bipartisan effort, led by U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin, D-West Virginia, to oppose “recent nationwide consolidation and review announcements that could severely diminish mail service reliability for postal networks across the country.”

U.S. House leaders, including U.S. Rep. Val Hoyle, an Oregon Democrat, and U.S. Rep. Cliff Bentz, an Oregon Republican, have also voiced strong opposition to the postmaster’s plan.

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee held a hearing April 16 to conduct oversight of the Postal Service. According to Merkley’s office this week, the hearing brought “bipartisan condemnation of the how the USPS has rolled out their consolidations and the negative impacts to service they are having throughout the country.”

During the hearing, one committee member, U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Georgia, told DeJoy his constituents spoke of undelivered prescriptions, late rent and mortgage payments, and delayed mail delivery. Ossoff told DeJoy he had “weeks, not months, to fix this,” noting, “If you don’t fix it — 36% on-time delivery — I don’t think you’re fit for this job.”

In Southern Oregon, the Postal Service first sought feedback last summer on its consolidation plan, which involved relocating a portion of processing operations from a Sage Road facility in Medford to Portland. Union leadership and members turned out in droves at community meetings and picketed local post office branches to oppose the plan, which began to be implemented in February despite community pushback.

Jeremy Schilling, president of the American Postal Workers Union Local 342, estimated that between 12 and 14 trucks and drivers were eliminated in late February, with entire days’ worth of outgoing mail held overnight at some locations due to a lack of space on delivery trucks. Additional delays came with the rerouting of sorting operations from Medford to Portland.

Schilling met with Merkley, a staunch critic of DeJoy’s plan, in late April to discuss the situation. Merkley’s office emailed constituents between Medford and Eugene seeking feedback on recent consolidations.

“To say the response has been overwhelming has been an understatement,” the senator’s office said in a message to the Times last week. “Since sending the email out last Friday, we have received well over 150 pages of responses from frustrated Oregonians, with the prevailing word being ‘ridiculous.’”

The message continued: “The overall theme from over the last few months: slow, slow, slow service and a deep worry that the ‘Delivering for America’ plan is doing irreparable harm to a cherished institution.”

Merkley’s office said the senator made a personal call to Postmaster General DeJoy in late April that went unanswered.

“This is unacceptable. If he has faith in his ‘Delivering for America’ plan, why is he unwilling to discuss it with a sitting member of Congress whose state is being hit by the changes?” Merkley’s office said in the message.

USPS spokesperson Kim Frum said in an email to the Times this week that service levels are being maintained and delays addressed.

“The Postal Service wants customers to know we’ve resolved most of the early transitional issues,” Frum said. “Within the last three months, management has adjusted and adapted transportation schedules and arranged for additional resources, such as extra trips, and will continue to do so as needed to ensure customers receive the reliable service they are accustomed to.”

Schilling, the union local president, said it is untrue that delays have been addressed. “Everything that arrives after 5 p.m. doesn’t leave, no matter what,” Schilling said. “For example, on Tuesday a carrier returned at 5 p.m. and was unable to get her outgoing mail and parcels on the truck … even though it was still here.”

The amount of mis-sorted parcels has “skyrocketed,” he said, “which is noteworthy because once it is mis-sent it has to start the whole trip to Portland and back again.

“So if we received a parcel for Shady Cove, we would historically get it there the next day. Not the case anymore.”

Local business owners attest to delays

Ken Burrows, a Medford resident who operates an online 3-D printing service, said delays at the Phoenix post office have impaired service to his customers.

“My livelihood is basically in the hands of the post office. When people make a comment like, ‘Oh, the package took forever to be delivered,’ that makes me look bad and affects whether people are placing orders,” he said.

“The post office used to be great. All my (online reviews) were about packages arriving faster than expected. … Now what I’ve noticed is, there are packages that are literally getting sent across the country, back and forth, to go to Portland. I don’t understand why they would make changes to make things go slower. … It’s almost like they’re not auditing their own efficiency.”

Cerberus Coffee owner Cody Gordon, who runs a coffee shop in Jacksonville and a roasting facility in Talent, said supplies have been slower to arrive and his customers have noticed product delays.

“We ship between 700 and 1,000 packages a week, and I think that one of the things that we have relied on in serving our customers is our centralized location between both Seattle and Southern California,” Gordon said.

“The fact things have to first go to Portland, and especially with mail being left behind a day or more, is frustrating. Any sort of delay creates some sort of pinch point. We’re roasting to order, five days a week. We have to know that that coffee is leaving once it’s packaged.”

One of Gordon’s customers is in Grants Pass. It took four days for a recent package to arrive.

Gordon said the delays had prompted him to “tighten things up” from an operations standpoint, “which is fine, but think of people waiting for medications or sending rent checks.”

Medford resident Cassie Anderson, a postal customer who expressed her frustrations with the USPS on social media, called the consolidation “an incredible illustration in inefficiency.”

“The ones that really get me are the ones that start off in California, actually scan here in Medford and then continue north on the (Interstate) 5 only to come back down to Medford again … eventually,” Anderson said in an interview.

Schilling, the union president, said he was unsure how to remedy some of the changes. Some can’t be undone, such as the decommissioning of needed equipment, he said.

He’s hopeful, however, that state and national leaders will convince DeJoy to reverse his plan.

If Postal Service standards are “supposedly being met,” Schilling said, “that’s merely them changing the standard — moving the goal post.”

Reach reporter Buffy Pollock at 458-488-2029 or [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter @orwritergal. This story first appeared in the Rogue Valley Times.