Distribution Directions 22 Union Negotiations, New Postmaster General, Potter Lifetime MTAC Membership

Contract negotiations with the American Postal Workers Union, AFL-CIO (APWU) and the National Rural Letter Carriers Association (NRLCA) expired at midnight Saturday, November 20th. While negotiations with the NRLCA resulted in an impasse, the Postal Service and the APWU agreed to extend the negotiation deadline until Tuesday, November 23rd at noon ET. Should APWU negotiations fail as they have with the NRLCA, a process begins which could result in a third party determining contract terms and work rules for more than 324,000 employees whose wages and benefits exceeded $20 billion last year. Unlike the private sector, when negotiations come to an impasse, Postal employees are not permitted to strike. That’s because Congress designated the Postal Service as an essential service to the nation. An arbitrator determines the final outcome and is not legally required to consider the Postal Service’s financial obligations when rendering a decision. The drop in the economy coupled with the shift to digital communications has created the greatest loss in mail volume since the Great Depression. The 2010 FY net loss was $8.5 billion. By 2020, mail volume is projected to drop to 150 billion pieces.

Source: USPS Press Release

Who Is the New Postmaster General

If he were running a Fortune 500 company -- supervising 700,000 employees, collecting billion’s in annual revenue -- Patrick Donahoe might well be a household name by now. And if the year were, say, 1935, Mr. Donahoe might well be known as one of the country's top politicians. But in 2010, Mr. Donahoe's promotion to the position of United States Postmaster General will go unnoticed by most casual news observers -- except, probably, by friends and family in his hometown of Pittsburgh. Mr. Donahoe, now the Deputy Postmaster General and Chief Operating Officer of the U.S. Postal Service, will take over for longtime Postmaster General John E. Potter, who has held the position since 2001 and is retiring December 3rd. Mr. Donahoe, 55, who still calls the Pittsburgh area home and returns there from Washington, D.C., many weekends, A 1977 graduate of the University of Pittsburgh with a bachelor's degree in economics, he still keeps a home in Venetia, Washington County. He said living around Pittsburgh in the 1980s, watching the steel industry suffer the way it did, informs his leadership priorities today. Mr. Donahoe, who will be the 73rd Postmaster General, is a lifelong Postal Service employee (except for the brief time as a youth that he spent working at a White Cross Drug Store). He entered the Postal Service as a clerk. Later he was put in charge of the service's local vehicle maintenance division, and then elevated to Vice President of the Allegheny Area Operation, a delivery zone that includes parts of Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia. He has been working out of Washington since 2000, serving first as senior Vice President of Human Resources, then Senior VP of Operations. That he is a Postal Service lifer, he said, gives him a broad perspective on the independent agency -- what it’s doing right and where it can improve.

Source: Pittsburgh Post Gazette

MTAC Awards Potter Lifetime Membership

Outgoing Postmaster General Jack Potter is an official lifetime member of the Mailers’ Technical Advisory Committee (MTAC). The group — which includes representatives of more than 100 commercial mailers and mailing associations — extended that honor to Potter at its quarterly meeting this month, as members recognized the PMG for his career-long support and dedication to the mailing industry.

Source: USPS News Link

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