Protests rock post office hearings

U.S. Postal Service officials got several earfuls at hearings in the South Bronx and Harlem last week, as the fight to save postal jobs and services escalated. On Nov. 21, about 150 people, including 50 to 60 letter carriers and other postal workers, jammed the auditorium at IS 214, a Bronx public school, to denounce the proposed closing of a major postal station serving that community.

Of the 34 threatened shutdowns in New York, half of them target the Bronx.

The District 12 Parents Association Presidents’ Council mobilized along with Bronx Community Board 6 to get people to the hearing, together with the South Bronx Community Congress and local leaders of Chapter 36 of the National Letter Carriers Union. Occupy Bronx was also present, as well as the Bronx Freedom Party and members of teachers’ and other public sector unions.

Another factor in the successful mobilization was a People’s Video Network film clip distributed on the Internet: http://tinyurl.com/bsgmvzz. In it, postal workers from around the country call for a movement to stop the effort to privatize the postal service, shut down 4,000-plus stations and axe more than 200,000 jobs.

The hearing at IS 214 followed two powerful hearings earlier in November at Co-op City — the largest naturally occurring retirement community in the U.S., with more than 55,000 senior residents. Retired postal workers organized these meetings, each of which drew close to 150 people.

More hearings are slated in the Bronx on Nov. 28, Nov. 29, Dec. 5, Dec. 8 and Dec. 12. Organizers for Community-Labor United for Postal Jobs and Services plan to rock all of these hearings.

Mike Eilenfeldt, a delegate to the NYC Central Labor Council and founding organizer of Community-Labor United for Postal Jobs & Services, said, “A movement in the spirit of Rosa Parks is the only thing that can save postal workers and the Postal Service from privatization.” His powerful testimony was echoed by numerous postal workers and community members.

Charlie Twist, a Bronx letter carrier, mentioned that the shutdown plans ignore the fact that postal workers already have heavy workloads. The fact that the USPS plans to move postal services to Duane Reade, Staples and CVS stores, and even banks — as stated in a document distributed by the postmaster at the hearing — shows that the shutdown plans are designed to break the union.

Harlem residents say ‘occupy’!

The next night, Nov. 22, more than 60 Harlem residents and supporters endured heavy rain to picket outside the very busy Lincolnton postal station, before attending a hearing about shutting the facility down. Inside, they blasted the Manhattan postmaster for ignoring the needs of the community. Johnnie Stevens, leading organizer of Community-Labor United for Postal Jobs & Services, called the closing of post offices racist and a form of gentrification.

A senior Black woman echoed a Lincolnton mail handler’s statement that his job for 20 years had been serving the village of Harlem. A woman who came from the South Bronx to attend explained how the shutdown, and other reduced postal services, would dramatically impact very poor residents in these communities. “Prisoners and their loved ones will be hard hit,” she said, since many of them send letters back and forth every day, and depend on the postal service as a lifeline. These are some of the people that U.S. Postmaster General Pat Donahoe and his friends on Wall Street simply do not see or care about as they prepare to hack away at people’s jobs and much needed services.

The word “occupy” came up often in the Lincolnton hearing — the first to take place inside a postal station. There was a mood to take the movement to stop the attacks on postal services and jobs to a new level. Chants rang out from the picket line: “The post office belongs to the people.” Supporters included Occupy Wall Street-en-Español, OWS Prisoners’ Caucus, Picture the Homeless and Occupy 4 Jobs, as well as Communication Workers of America Local 1180 and Teamsters Local 808 secretary-treasurer, Chris Silvera.

The same militant mood came across in a resolution from the executive board of the New York Metro Area Postal Union, issued Nov. 15, declaring strong support for Occupy Wall Street. The resolution said, “Postal workers and the public that we serve are fighting to Save America’s Postal Service. … This is just one struggle in a myriad of attacks on working people that Occupy Wall Street has been able to bring into focus so everyone can see.”

Chuck Zlatkin, legislative and political director of the New York Metro Area Postal Union, highlighted the federal law governing postal service. U.S. Code 39, Section 101, states: “The United States Postal Service shall be operated as a basic and fundamental service provided to the people. … The Postal Service shall provide a maximum degree of effective and regular postal services to rural areas, communities, and small towns where post offices are not self-sustaining. No small post office shall be closed solely for operating at a deficit, it being the specific intent of the Congress that effective postal services be insured to residents of both urban and rural communities.”

Zlatkin noted that congressional mandates in recent years violate this statute, and instead “have used the Postal Service as a cash cow for decades. … Thousands of post offices, hundreds of mail processing facilities, and hundreds of thousands of living wage jobs are being threatened.” According to Zlatkin, “Two independent studies have shown that the USPS has overpaid $50-75 billion into the Civil Service Retirement System, and has $42 billion being held hostage in a fund to prepay future retirees’ health benefits.”

The presidents’ councils of both the American Postal Workers Union and the National Association of Letter Carriers recently called for a large-scale national mobilization of union members and supporters to stop the attack on jobs and services.

Go to https://www.youtube.com/peoplesvideo#p/a/u/1/BDV2zXU05SQ