September 10, 2023 • 47 mins
On this week's episode, Special Assistant to the President Douglas Lape joins the discussion on "You Are the Current Resident" for a closer look at USPS Sorting and Delivery Centers (S&DCs). Tune in wherever you listen to podcasts!
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:08):
Hello, brothers, sisters and friends, and
welcome to the you are thecurrent resident podcast.
This is the official podcast of the
National Association of Letter Carriers,the union that represents 280,000 active
and retired city letter carriers employedby the United States Poastal Service.
I'm Ed Morgan and sitting next to me, as
always, is our nationalPresident, Brian Renfroe.
(00:31):
Hey, Brian.How are you?
Eddie?Doing great.
Good to be back with youfor another episode.
We've got an exciting topic today, but
before we get into that, are the Philliesstill ten and a half games back?
They'll be ten and ahalf the whole season.
We'll stick with that.I like it.
As long as we make theplayoffs, we're good.
All right, so today we're going to be
talking about the United States PostalServices delivering for America plan.
(00:54):
That's a great name.Wonder where they stole that from.
And S and DCs.
I sat down earlier this week and came up
with some questions that our members mighthave had if I didn't ask your question.
You can always reach out throughour Ask The Mailbag segment.
Submit your questions to us by email atsocial@nalc.org. So can you talk us
through the overall USPSdelivering for America plan?
(01:17):
Yeah, and you're right.They got the name right.
That's a phrase that we've used for
several years now and actually had acampaign back in 2020 when there was a lot
of COVID relief legislation on the tablethat we called Delivering for America.
But anyway, back to the plan.
Let me start with a little bit of history
(01:38):
and where this plan comes from, and thenwe'll get into every detail of it, but
we'll get into the details that arerelevant to what we do every day and the
things that we're seeingaround the country.
So back in 2020, when the currentPostmaster General Louis DeJoy, took
office, he began working withthe Board of Governors.
(02:03):
And at that time, the chair of the Board
of Governors was a governor, a good friendof ours, a guy by the name of Ron Bloom.
His term has since ended, sohe's no longer a governor.
But they worked together to develop a plan
that would play out overthe next ten years or so.
And the purpose of that plan was to put
(02:23):
the Postal Service on a sustainablefinancial path to protect service and even
expand, in a lot of cases, the servicethat we provide to our customers.
Sowe are not in a place where I'm going to
say that we have agreed with100% of every bit of that plan.
But it was refreshing in a general sense
(02:47):
compared to what we had seen really forthe last decade plus, where that was
leadership at the Postal Service thatreally wanted to try to cut their way into
sustainability by reducing service andfurther slowing down the mail and all
sorts of things that justnever made any sense.
So the plan was a work in progressfor a while but then was released.
(03:10):
They call it the Delivering for America
plan and there are pieces of theplan that have already happened.
One piece, maybe most notably is a
legislative piece wherewe working with the Postal Service as well
as the other stakeholders were able towork with members of Congress and the
White House to pass really monumentallegislation that reformed the Postal
(03:33):
Service called the PostalReform Act of 2021.
That bill was signed into law in2022 and it did three main things.
Number one, it repealed a mandate that had
been in place since 2006 for the PostalService to pre fund future retiree health
benefits that was costing them anywherefrom five to $6 billion a year.
(03:55):
And it's an obligation that no othercompany in America, public or private had.
It also, at a higher rate, integrated
Medicare with retiree,healthcare for postal retirees.
If you go back a few episodes ago, we
talked about that Medicareintegration in detail.
So you can listen to that ifyou're curious about that.
(04:18):
It also made six day delivery a permanent
part of the law and those key componentsof that legislation are part of this plan.
So that was a really good way to start it.
As far as what I think we'll really dive
into today are what the portionsof the plan that we are seeing.
And that has to do with realigning andmodifying and modernizing, hopefully the
(04:43):
Postal Services processingand delivery network.
And I'll start kind of in a general sense
and then, Eddie, I'm sure as we goforward, we'll get into more details.
But basicallythere's a recognition that our model of
processing and delivering mailwas created in a time where the vast, vast
(05:07):
majority of the mail that we handledand delivered were letters and flats.
And over time the mix of mail has changed.
I mean, all letter carriers know wedeliver way more parcels than we used to.
We handle fewer letters and flats,particularly in the office.
For us on office time we don't case thatmuch mail anymore compared to years past.
(05:32):
So you have a network that was built to
handle letters and flats when we'renow handling far, far more parcels.
So from a processing perspective, it is
modernizing to meet the demands of themail mix that we see now and then as we'll
get into in depth here in a few minutes onthe delivery side, trying to ensure that
(05:55):
we can be in a place where, from adelivery perspective, we're able to get
mail to carriers early and be able toprovide the service that we need to
provide out there withthe modern mix of mail.
So that's the piece thatI think we'll focus on.
There were other pieces of the plan thathave already happened one of which I'll
(06:17):
point out that's notable that we did notsupport and that was a modification to
service standards incertain geographic areas.
So in the past we had a two to three daystandard on first class mail going coast
to coast that was modified,I guess almost two years ago now, to be
(06:38):
increased from three to fourdays as opposed to two to three.
And the postal service's reasoning for
doing that was that they simply wereunable to make the two to three day
standard if we go back toCOVID looking in 2020.
During that peak season, we had a lot ofdifficulty with delays in the mail and
(07:00):
some of that was due tocapacity on airlines.
So the reason for this change was thatthey were able to take all first class
mail off of planes and moveit to ground transportation.
So even a letter going from the Northeast
to Southern California now travels byground transportation and their reasoning
(07:23):
behind it was, look, we have a two tothree day standard we can't make because
we're trying to put this mail onplanes that don't have the capacity.
So we'll move it to the ground and asopposed to having a two to three day
standard at taking a week to get there,we'll have a three to four day standard
and it will actually makeit in three to four days.
And I have to say that
(07:43):
in retrospect, while we have never andwill never support slowing the mail down
from the standard, they have madethat standard since it's been made.
They changed it to a threeto four day standard.
So the performance there has been muchbetter since that change went into play.
So that's one of the earlychanges that we did not support.
(08:06):
Really what we'll get into today is what
they're doing on thedelivery side of the house.
What affects us some movement of carriers.
That it's not really a matter ofwhether we support it or not.
It's more a matter of how we're able toenforce our collective bargaining
agreement and ensure that as they takethese type actions that we make it the
(08:27):
best we possibly can for the lettercarriers that are impacted by it and
obviously, ultimately, the servicethat we provide to our customers.
So I'm sure we'll get a little more in
depth on the S and DC sideof the house here shortly.
Were we consulted with this plan?
Yeah, we were involved from a veryearly stage in conversations.
(08:50):
In fact, there's a lot of pieces of the
plan that at some point or another were inlet's call it draft form or even maybe
conceptual that wethought were a bad idea.
We voiced that and those thingsultimately did not make it into the plan.
So yes, we've been very involvedin this from the beginning.
(09:14):
It's something that I give them a lot ofcredit for their communication with us.
There were things that were in some ways
left over from previous leadership at thePostal Service that were just bad ideas.
And that mostly included service cuts andstuff like that, reducing retail locations
(09:36):
and closing post officesand things like that.
I think through that communication we
expressed the real problems with a lot ofthose things and ultimately we're able to
keep those things frombecoming a part of the plan.
When I say keep them from becoming a part
of the plan, it's just more aboutcommunication and the understanding that
(09:59):
the folks over in leadership at the PostalService gain, through conversations with
us that not do things in a plan thatwould end up harming.
If indeed the goal was what they stated,to modernize and provide that service.
Anything that would negatively impact our
ability to do that, we were able to talkthrough and get a lot of that removed.
(10:24):
So the plan itself in its currentstate is there was no surprises to us.
There are things that we had communicatedabout all along and been preparing for.
So yeah, we were definitely involved and
I have to give thema good deal of credit compared to maybe
what we've seen over at LaFonte Plaza inyears past, that there was very open lines
(10:48):
of communication and the same iscontinued as we see this implemented.
Can you explain what an S and DC is?Yeah.
So this is the piece of the plan that we
are seeing and dealing with morethan anything else on a daily basis.
So S and DC stands forSorting and delivery centers.
(11:08):
And the conceptjust to explain in a general sense, and
then we'll get into alittle bit more detail.
If you take a city the way the Postal
Services processing and delivery networkis set up, you will have multiple mail
processing facilities and thendozens, if not more delivery units.
(11:32):
And in each of those delivery units you
would have from each processing location,you have these truck routes.
In some cases, those arepostal employees running trucks.
In a lot of cases, they'recontractors that are transporting mail
(11:53):
from processing locationsto delivery units.
They may stop at a number of delivery
units along the way, and then also in theevening and at night, they're bringing
mail back from the delivery unitsto the processing locations.
In general, what they are doing isreducing the number of processing
(12:13):
locations but expandingthe capacity to process.
So let's say, for example, you have in a
particular metropolitan areaseven mail processing locations.
They may reduce that to two or threelocations, but actually increase the
capacity to process becausethey're in much larger locations.
(12:35):
On the delivery side of things, they have
identified places to create these sortingand Delivery centers, or S and DCs.
And what they do with an S and DC is movea number of different delivery units.
And there's certain criteriathat they get into.
And I'm sure we'll get intothat a little more in a minute.
(12:56):
But they move certain deliveryunits into these S and DCS.
So you've got a whole bunchof carriers in one location.
And what that does is reduce the amount oftransportation of mail, be it by postal
employees or contractors, in a lot ofcases, between the mail processing
facilities or locationsand delivery units.
(13:17):
Now you've just got a whole bunch of mailgoing to one place in an S and DC, and
then the transportation is essentiallytransferred from whatever the
transportation route wasonto the carrier's route.
So in most cases, once a delivery unit
moves to an S and DC, a carrier is goingto leave there and have to travel some
distance to get out tobegin their first delivery.
(13:42):
By reducing that transportation and movingit on to carrier routes,
combined with increasing the capacity toprocess mail,
the vision here is to create a more stablenetwork with a larger capacity that
has fewer variables in terms of thethings that affect us every day.
(14:04):
So we all know we've been at work in themorning, in the office and a truck's late
or one little thing gets out of kilter andall of a sudden we're waiting on our mail
and everything's behind and weall know how that cycle goes.
And the idea here is to grow thatcapacity, but then also to decrease
the possibility for that happening to havemore consistent processing and
(14:28):
transportation which ultimately, hopefullyresults in more consistent delivery.
So a sorting and delivery center is alocation where they have moved multiple
delivery units into a single locationwhere mail will be transported from the
processing facility anddistributed to the carriers.
(14:49):
How are they deciding wherethese things are going to go?
Yeah, there's a lot of different factors.
They try to one, for example, is they tryto keep them within a
30 minutes transportation fromwhere the routes originally were.
If you look at a big map
(15:10):
in pretty much every metropolitan area inthe country, they've identified locations
where they canwithin 30 minutes maximize the number of
delivery units they canget into one S and DC.
And there's other things that we look at.
Some of the services we want to expand in
the future, such as same day delivery andsome of the local connect and some of the
(15:35):
other services that wereally want to see grow.
There's some market analysis that they use
in terms of where potential revenueand mail volume could come from.
That's all a piece of it too, but for themost part it's kind of plotting on a map
with criteria based on obviously where themail processing locations are as well.
(15:59):
So some of it's due to availability offacilities and sometimes that's existing
postal facilities, in some cases theygo lease or buy other facilities.
So there's a number of differentfactors that play into it.
But there's been a lot of communicationabout how they make those decisions here
(16:19):
over the last really, I guessyear and a half or so now.
How many are they going to do?
There's a little bit of an evolution thattakes place here, but right now over the
course of this ten year plan, which has, Iguess a little over eight years
left, they are looking at somewhere in theneighborhood of 400 of these S and DCs.
(16:43):
We are not close to having 400 of them.
We're just with I think a coupleof dozen or so out there now.
But we've definitely every few monthswe've got several more that are scheduled
to come online and later on today we'llget more in detail about what we do as far
as NALC internally to try to prepare andgain information and anticipate issues
(17:08):
that may come upand address those ahead of time.
Are they contractuallyallowed to move us like this?
Yeah.So there is no contractual prohibition
really on the Postal Servicemoving anybody anywhere.
When it comes to things, we have toremember is they own these facilities and
(17:30):
the Postal Service has their routeand have over time
relocated work locations and moveroutes and things like that.
I think where the contractual piece comesin this is very important for us is based
on the nature or the factcircumstances of a particular move.
(17:51):
We have contractual provisions that apply.
The majority of that is going to be found
in Article Twelve of ourcollective bargaining agreement.
In Article Twelve,
section One C, one, Two and three, there'sa number of different scenarios that are
covered there that if that is a scenariothat they choose to move
(18:15):
a location that fits into one of thosescenarios, there's lots of provisions
there that do things like protectseniority and stuff like that.
This particular case,
these S and DCs are a little different andthey're similar to something we've dealt
with for over a decade now called DeliveryUnit Optimization where they are moving
(18:37):
all the carriers from one location toanother, but the post office where they
move them from, what we call thelosing installation remains open.
So that's not something that is clearly
covered by ArticleTwelve of our agreement.
So we negotiated back, signed back inJanuary of this year, a couple of
(18:57):
different memorandums ofunderstanding that cover that.
I think those M numbers, if you want to
look in our materials reference systemon the website are M 1990 and M 1991.
That covers some specifics that the postal
Service has to follow whenever theymove folks into these locations.
I read the Postal Recordarticle about the plan.
(19:19):
Can you explain the gaining andlosing installation language?
Yeah, so the losing installation is wherethe assignments are being moved from and
the gaining installation will bethat sorting and Delivery center.
So in M 1990, which is an MoU that wenegotiated and signed back in January of
(19:40):
this year, there's a lot of differentrules that are laid out there.
In fact, there's 13 different items in
that agreement that talksabout what will happen.
It talks about how seniority and bidassignments, how we deal with those.
It gets into what happens to hold downsand temporary higher level assignments
(20:04):
under Article 25, section Four, it getsinto what happens with annual leave
request and what happenswith route adjustments.
Obviously, when you move routes, you're
moving them to a place, and in a lot ofcases we're adding travel time to them.
So these agreements coverhow we deal with that in the short term
and then eventually how weevaluate and adjust those routes.
(20:26):
So there's a lot of different if you readthat Postal Record article, we covered a
number of these things and we'll get intoit a little more in depth of how we deal
with each specific locationdifferently a little bit later on.
Butthe gaining is going to be the
installation that's createdwhere the S and DC is typically that's
(20:47):
going to be moved into an existinginstallation, and then the losing
installation will be wherethe routes move from.
And throughout that agreement in M 1990,you'll see those two terms used a lot that
reference both installationsthat are involved.
I love my Stewart.
Are they going to come with me?Yeah.
Part of moving into these S and DCs, and
(21:10):
part of the agreement I just talkedabout is that all carriers move.
So all routes move.
There's no moving some and not others.
So that makes this different than
some movement we see pursuant to ArticleTwelve, in some cases we see movement
that's not necessitated by the PostalService wanting to move people.
(21:33):
Sometimes it can be necessitated by having
too many people in one location,what we call an excess of employees.
And in that case it's seniority based and
there is something for stewardscalled super seniority.
But in the case of movement withan S and DC, all the carriers go.
So everybody that's there with you and allthose routes will move to the S and DC.
(21:56):
If you're involved.
What happens to my senioritylist and my seniority?
Everybody maintains theirseniority when you are moved.
That's one of the specific things that we
covered in the agreement that wenegotiated is everybody retains their
craft installation seniorityand their bid assignment.
(22:17):
So you stay on your routeand for the purposes of the way you accrue
seniority, this is covered, I believe, inArticle 41, section Two, B seven,
you're considered to have gained all thatseniority in the gaining instllation.
So where you are in the S and DC.
(22:37):
What happens with theovertime Equitability list?
Is it just for the people I cameover with or the whole new building?
The short answer is that depends.
It can be the entire building that's going
to be subject towhether your local Memorandum of
understanding divides thatinstallation by section.
(23:02):
When you move into a location, many timesyou'll have multiple local memorandums of
understanding from each of theplaces that are moving in.
And there's a process that's laid out inthat Moum 1991 that talks about that.
So it depends on what those Lmous sayand ultimately depends on what language.
(23:24):
Once we reconcile those Lmous through a
process that we have and we'll get intothat a little bit more in a little while.
Do I have to work overtime in anunfamiliar zip code or route?
Question is kind of similar tothe question about overtime.
Equitability.The answer is maybe.
So these are combined into one
(23:44):
installation once wemove into an S and DC.
So absent language, otherwise in an Lmou,if you're on the overtime desired list,
then you would be considered availablefor all the routes there.
But again, that's subject to what the
Lmou, how it divides, if it divides initem 18, that installation by section.
(24:09):
How is this good for my route?
Well, what we've found in the ones that we
have had implemented so far,know, most routes gain travel time.
So you're gaining travel time from the newS and DC to your first delivery and then
from your last deliveryback to the S and DC.
And then once we evaluate the routes andget them adjusted, for the most part we're
(24:33):
trading delivery, know, forjust simple travel time.
And for most folks that is a positive
thing that we're just riding in a vehiclefor a few and it ranges from anywhere to
it could be just a few minutes, up to 2030minutes or so a day in each direction.
It just depends on the geographicsof a particular location.
(24:56):
Sothe feedback and the response from most
folks has been positive in that regardthat trading off some delivery time for
travel time is definitely a littleeasier and better for the carrier.
What happens with my branches Lmou?
Yeah, so the agreement I mentioned in theMrs, it's M 1991, it includes a process
(25:21):
where if you have multiple installationsthat are involved,
basically the parties get together and tryto resolve any differences in the Lmou.
So if you have multiple Lmous from the
losing installations that are combined andthere are differences there,
(25:44):
I think it's important to note this isseparate and apart from normal Article 30
local implementation that we have after weget a new collective bargaining agreement,
those issues are talked about by therepresentatives at the local level.
Those would be obviously the branch
presidents that are involvedin the installation head.
(26:06):
And then there's a resolution processfor any issues that are not resolved.
They go up tothe national business agent and they also
go up to the postal services,field labor relations folks.
And then if they can't resolve something,
it'll come here to thenational level for resolution.
One thing to note, and I don't foresee
(26:29):
this happening anytime soon, butanything's possible in the event once this
process is done in the event, at somepoint in the future, these
locations in an S and DC arereturned to their original location.
Then the original
Know is basically reinstated as ifit had never been changed.
(26:52):
Sothat's the process,
and it's just to resolve anydifferences that may conflict.
If we're not in an S and DC yet, are we
going to have to change somelanguage when our Lmou opens up?
No, there'd be no requirement for that.
If you are not currentlyif you have not been moved to an S and DC,
(27:17):
then there's nothing that wouldrequire you to open your Lmou.
I mean, obviously, through the normal
Article 30 local implementationprocess, you could do that.
And I'm sure at whatever point local
implementation happens, which will be herein the next few months, at some point,
those locations that we know werescheduled to move into an S and DC.
(27:40):
We'll definitely keep that in mind, andwe'll get into a little more detail in a
few minutes about what our internalprocess is and the things that we look at.
So I guess it's possible that we may,during that local implementation period,
if we know we have things that areinevitable where we're going to move and
we're able to resolve somethings, then we may do that.
(28:01):
But there's nothing that will require you
to make any changes unless youare involved in an S and DC.
And there are differences in the Lmous of
the routes from the Losing installations,Lmous that are moved into the S and DCs.
If there are differences, yes,you have to resolve that.
(28:23):
Butthere's no requirement that anything else
be changed during normallocal implementation.
So the last few questions weretalking a little bit know branch.
So here's, let's get back totheir rank and file carrier.
Where do my customers pick up their mailor parcel when I have to leave a notice?
Yeah.So what happens in the S and DCs?
(28:45):
Remember that when the carriers move
the location, you move from the losinginstallation, that Post Office stays open.
So if there's a windowthere, it's still open.
So what we do is, at the end of the day,
whatever you would bring back, be that apiece of mail, something you left notice
for and accountable, whateverthe case may be a parcel.
(29:07):
You bring it back to the S and DC,
and then the following morning,one of the carriers.
And sometimes it's the carrier who'sthe post office is on their route.
Sometimes it may be another carrier.
That stuff will be given to thatcarrier to drop off at the Post Office.
(29:28):
So it doesn't change where acustomer has to go get their mail.
So if you have an accountable pieceof mail, you leave a notice for it.
That customer is going to go to thesame place that they've always gone to.
So that was one of the big pieces of this,
that while moving us, these S and DCs wedefinitely didn't want to inconvenience
(29:48):
customers by having themtravel further to get their stuff.
So from their perspective, it'll all be atthat same location where it's always been.
How does that notifiedmail piece get there?
Yeah, one of the carriers the next morning
will take everything for that particularstation or finance unit is really what it
(30:11):
is at that point,and bring it out and drop it off.
So anything that was noticedwas left for the day before.
Then that customer will be ableto go there and pick it up.
All right, well, we have a special guest
going to come in and Brad, doyou want to introduce him?
So we've been talking about S and DCStoday, and I'd like for us to spend a
(30:33):
little bit of time tolet you all know what we NALC here at the
national level and we'll get into alsowhat we do at the regional level and the
branch level doing preparationfor each of these S and DCS.
And here to help me with that, who does a
lot of work in that regard, is oneof our letter carrier staffers.
(30:56):
He is special assistant tothe president, Doug Lape.
So, Doug, welcome.Thank you, Brian.
Appreciate it.
Before we get into this stuff, why don'tyou just tell us briefly a little bit
about yourself and where you'refrom and all that stuff.
I know, but I think they'dbe interested to know.
Sure.
So I'm a letter carrier out ofBranch 43 in Cincinnati, Ohio.
(31:18):
I've been with the PostalService since 1996.
Started as a clerk, decided I didn't wantto be inside all day when it was 95
degrees or 2ft of snow onthe ground in Cincinnati.
So in 1998, I switched over to carrying.
Coming up on my 25th year.
So October 10 of thisyear will be 25 years.
Worked as a union activist inBranch 43 for a long time.
(31:41):
Became Vice Presidentof my branch in 2011.
And then in 2017, I came up here to
headquarters as an assistant to thePresident working in City Delivery.
Yeah.And Doug's done a great job and he worked
in City Delivery for a few years and forthe last, I guess about a year now, he's
worked a lot with me and a couple othersthere on a number of different projects.
(32:07):
And one of Doug's main things is dealingwith the sorting and delivery centers.
So we get notice from the Postal Service
and communication that know, hey, in suchand such month we intend to move these
places into this newlyestablished S and DC.
And from that point forward, we start a
(32:27):
process of communication with the branchand through the regional offices
to really just try to gather all theinformation we can possibly gather.
And once we gather all that information,we try to anticipate any issues that may
be specific to that locationand try to resolve those issues.
(32:47):
But Doug.Why don't we start there?
And once we get that notification and weknow that these places are going to move
to this new s and DC, why don't you justtalk us through a little bit of what you
do, working with each of the NBA officesand reaching out to the branches in terms
of gathering that information and tryingto identify issues that we may have.
(33:09):
Absolutely.
So we meet with the Postal Service everyother week on the S and DC initiative.
We get the list of the potential sites
that are going to be implemented, and wehave three implementation dates per year
one in February, 1 in June,and one in September.
After we get that list, we then take these
(33:30):
losing installations and determineif there's an impact to our craft.
To do that, we look and see how many citycarriers and how many routes actually
exist in the S and DC andin the losing installation.
Some of these officeshave no impact to us.
For example, our first office, the Athens
(33:50):
S and DC, there were city carriers alreadyworking in the building, and all of the
city carriers that were there beforeimplementation still worked there.
No city carriers were moved in.
It was all rural.
So after we've determined that there isgoing to be an impact, meaning there are
going to be city carriers moved into anS and DC, what we do is we reach out to
(34:11):
each NBA and we startasking for information.
We want to verify that what we've beentold by the Postal Service is correct.
We want to know the number of routesthat exist in the losing office.
We want to know the number of routes thatexist in the S and DC, and we want to know
the branches that represent each one,because we like to have as much
communication as possible with both thebusiness agents offices and the branches.
(34:36):
So what that means is, once we've gathered
all of that information, determined howmany offices are going to be moved into
the S and DC, how many city carrier routesare going to move, we set up meetings with
the business agents offices and theregions or the regions and the branches,
so we can sit down and explainto them what's going on.
There are right now threemodels in the S and DC.
(35:00):
There is a model where all of the routes
in an installation are moved from thelosing installation into the S and DC.
That is the process that's covered under M
1990 and M 1991, which I thinkyou talked about earlier.
The second process is where they movedelivery units within an installation.
(35:21):
For example, in Topeka, Kansas, in June of
this year, they implemented an S and DC,and the only offices that were moved were
delivery units withinthe Topeka installation.
That's something which is not reallycovered by the National Agreement.
The Postal Service has the right to move
their delivery unitswithin an installation.
There's no impact toseniority bid assignments.
(35:42):
Lmous, because they all work in the sameinstallation before and after the
establishment of the S and DC, there'sreally nothing that needs to be done other
than explaining to the carrierswhat's going to happen.
The third situation is a little bit more
unique, and that's where they take onedelivery unit from an installation and
(36:02):
move it into thejurisdiction of an S and DC.
For example, back in June of this year,
the Hanover Park, Illinois S and DC wasestablished, and one delivery unit from
the Elgin, Illinois installation wasmoved out of Elgin into Hanover Park.
So once we've determined the S and DC
(36:24):
locations, the losing installations, andwhether there's an impact of the craft, we
determine how thosecarriers are being moved.
So we want to sit down and talk to thebranches and explain to them this is the
process that covers this movement, just tomake sure they understand all the rules.
Whether it's under M 1990 and 1991,whether it's under Article Twelve, which
(36:48):
is the circumstance like in Hanover Park,Illinois, or whether it's just the
movement of delivery unitswithin installation.
Yeah.
As you might imagine, just based oneverything Doug just talked about when
you've got now we're up to,what are we, 20 something?
We're at twelve right now, but we havemore offices coming online the beginning.
(37:10):
Of September that we knoware sort of in process.
And then in each of those you haveanywhere from it may just be two or three
installations that are moving in, oryou may have up to an unlimited number.
So there's quite a bit of workthat goes in there.
So we try to do that, and then Dougcommunicates with the postal service.
(37:34):
As far as issues that we see, Doug, I wantto touch on a couple of other things that
we have to deal with, and that issometimes we only have like, a single
branch involved here where placesfrom one single branch move in.
And in that case,
it's pretty straightforward asfar as the representation piece.
But then other times we have multiple
(37:55):
branches and part of theinformation that we gather.
And then when that's the case, ultimately
I have to make a decision as to what therepresentation there will look like.
And that's something, I think, early on in
this process, that we startto gather information.
(38:15):
I know you have a lot of communication
with the branches that are potentiallyinvolved, and we try to figure out the
best thing to do when itcomes to representation too
Right, So as I said earlier, we sit down
and talk to the brancheswith the regional offices.
It's a little bit easier when we'retalking about one branch that represents
all of the carriers that are moving intothe S and DC, as well as the S and DC.
(38:38):
It gets a little more complicatedwhen we have multiple branches.
The example I gave aboutHanover Park, Illinois.
There were two branches involved one thatrepresented the carriers in the delivery
unit from Elgin and one that representedthe carriers in Hanover Park.
We've had other circumstances, such as in
Bryan, Texas, where there's been multiplebranches, utica, New York, which has had
(39:01):
three branches now thatcoexist within the S and DC.
So we have to explain
all of this to every branch so theyunderstand how this is going to work.
They understand the Lmou issues that they
need to discuss,which involves more than just one person,
one branch president talking tothe postmaster of the S and DC.
(39:23):
We need to make sure they understandeverything that's going to happen and how
their branch is going to beimpacted by this change.
Yeah.
And it kind of goes back to the wholeprinciple that we've used since the
beginning of this, is there are thingsthat each of these have in common, but
they all are also unique based on anumber of different circumstances.
(39:44):
It can be anything.
Sometimes it's geography,where we have locations that move, and you
have challenges createdby the amount of travel that they have
from the new S and DC orthe routes that are available to them as
far as traveling to andfrom their first delivery.
Another piece I wanted to hit on thatdefinitely everyone that's moved into one
(40:10):
of these S and DCs will be impacted by,and that is the process in M 1990 for
evaluating and adjusting theroutes because they're impacted.
And there's kind of a little interim thing
that we do initially and then ultimatelythere's a route adjustment piece that
happens post actualmovement into the location.
(40:32):
So why don't you describe kind of what
that process looks like, both initiallywhat we do in advance and then what
happens a few weeks after wemove into those locations.
Right.So one of the big things that we discussed
both internally and with the PostalService is how do we make any sort of
(40:54):
arrangements for the fact that thesecarriers are going to have potentially
more travel time when theymove into the S and DC.
And what we're talking about is whenyou're at your original delivery unit, you
may have had a certain amount of time toget from your office to your first
delivery point and then fromyour last delivery point back.
(41:14):
Once that route moves to the S and DC,there could be an additional travel time.
So you're going to have more time to get
from the S and DC to your firstdelivery and more time to drive back.
At the end of the day, what we tried to dois come up with a way, and I think we did
it in M 1990 is for the national partieswho are involved in the joint route
adjustment process to sit down andestimate the time that it's going to take
(41:39):
that carrier to get totheir first delivery.
And then back once they'vefinished their route.
Keep in mind, this is only an estimate.
It is not an exact.
There's no way to get the exact numbers
until somebody actuallydrives it on a regular basis.
But we wanted to make it clear to bothlocal management and the letter carrier
serving the route that we all acknowledgethat there's been an impact to your route.
(42:04):
We know there's more traveltime on a daily basis.
So that route, which may have been 8 hoursbefore it moved, could potentially be
eight and a half, 845,whatever that number is.
So that was the first part of it that wedid before the movement of the S and DC.
So before about 30 days before
the routes actually move, the postmasterand the branch president or their
(42:29):
designees will sit down and explain toevery carrier on their route, this is what
the national parties have agreed, this isthe new estimated time for your route.
Yeah.And the idea is just simply to
there's a fine line, I guess, between sortof projecting what it'll look like, but in
this case, we're not really projectingwell, we're not projecting delivery time.
(42:54):
We can come reasonably close to figuring
out how long it takes to travelfrom one point to another.
So the idea is that there be a recognition
among everybody, local management as wellas the carriers, of what that change is.
And then we use our joint route adjustment
process, once they're implemented,to evaluate and adjust them.
(43:18):
So if you're in one ofthese new S and DCs.
Chances are you probably have seen Doug,
because I think he's visitedall of them as we go forward.
He'll continue to do that, know a number
of our other staff here at headquarters,as well as several of the officers, and
know folks from your national businessagents office will be out there.
(43:41):
The important thing for us is just to doeverything we can to ensure that we have
the right amount of communication, that wegain the information that we need to do
what's best for each oneof these individual sites.
And ultimately, when it comes to the
representation side, any decision that wemake here, and I'm speaking for myself
(44:04):
here, we're going to make the decisionthat's in the best interest of the members
that are impacted thereand their representation.
Doug, is there anything else related to
S and DCS that you think would beuseful for the listeners to think?
You know, as Brian mentioned, I do getout and I travel to all these S and DCS.
(44:27):
There's a lot of construction going on in
these facilities because once they'redone, they all look the same, they have
the same color scheme, they all havenew cases, which is a blue case.
And I'll tell you, as I said, I'vebeen in the Postal Service since 1996.
November of last year was the first time
I'd ever seen a case thatwas less than 30 years old.
(44:48):
So they are doing somethings that are nice.
They are remodeling all of the bathrooms,new fixtures they're putting in, new water
fountains that have waterbottle fillers and filters.
Every office is getting an ice machine,not just the offices that may work in the
more hot and humid or those places thathave a little bit hotter temperatures.
(45:14):
So I think we need to be cognizant ofthe fact that nobody likes the change.
People like to stay where they're at.
But at the end of the day, thesefacilities do look a lot nicer.
Some of them are being cleaned for the
first time in years,which is always a positive.
And I think the reason we really want toget out and see these offices is, as I
(45:35):
mentioned at the very beginning, that wedo meet with the postal service every two
weeks, and they tell us thestatus of these offices.
And brian, from the very beginning, hasmade the decision that we're going to get
out there, and we're going to see ifwhat we're being told is accurate.
And it really does open your eyes when you
get into these offices, instead of justlooking at a single picture in a
(45:56):
PowerPoint presentation to see what theissues are so that we can address those
with the postal service and getthem fixed as quickly as possible.
Yeah, I know this will shock everyone
that's listening, but early on inparticular, we found a lot of places where
they'd show us some beautiful picture, andwe'd go out there, and the bathrooms
(46:18):
weren't working orwhatever the case may be.
And hopefully that's gotten
I think that's probably gotten a littlebit better, but that just kind of
highlights the importanceof the communication.
When we've had this communication, and
those issues have been raised by our folkslocally or at the regional level,
we have had very good success in terms ofgetting those things addressed up here.
(46:43):
So the s and DCs, as Dougmentioned, any movement?
We are kind of creatures of habit, and we
don't like change, but there arepositives, and he mentioned several of
them that come alongwith this in terms of the amenities.
And it just
may take, in a lot of cases, a littlebit longer to get there for some people.
(47:03):
But usually when it comes to the buildingitself, once all the construction and that
stuff's completed, they aredefinitely better places to work.
Well, Doug, thanks so much for joining us.
We appreciate all the work you'redoing out there on the S and DCs.
And for those of you thatare involved in S and DCs.
In the near future, there's a goodchance that you'll get to meet them.
(47:25):
So thanks for joining us.
All right, thank you.
Hello, brothers, sisters and friends, and
welcome to the you are thecurrent resident podcast.
This is the official podcast of the
National Association of Letter Carriers,the union that represents 280,000 active
and retired city letter carriers employedby the United States Poastal Service.
I'm Ed Morgan and sitting next to me, as
always, is our nationalPresident, Brian Renfroe.
(00:31):
Hey, Brian.How are you?
Eddie?Doing great.
Good to be back with youfor another episode.
We've got an exciting topic today, but
before we get into that, are the Philliesstill ten and a half games back?
They'll be ten and ahalf the whole season.
We'll stick with that.I like it.
As long as we make theplayoffs, we're good.
All right, so today we're going to be
talking about the United States PostalServices delivering for America plan.
(00:54):
That's a great name.Wonder where they stole that from.
And S and DCs.
I sat down earlier this week and came up
with some questions that our members mighthave had if I didn't ask your question.
You can always reach out throughour Ask The Mailbag segment.
Submit your questions to us by email atsocial@nalc.org. So can you talk us
through the overall USPSdelivering for America plan?
(01:17):
Yeah, and you're right.They got the name right.
That's a phrase that we've used for
several years now and actually had acampaign back in 2020 when there was a lot
of COVID relief legislation on the tablethat we called Delivering for America.
But anyway, back to the plan.
Let me start with a little bit of history
(01:38):
and where this plan comes from, and thenwe'll get into every detail of it, but
we'll get into the details that arerelevant to what we do every day and the
things that we're seeingaround the country.
So back in 2020, when the currentPostmaster General Louis DeJoy, took
office, he began working withthe Board of Governors.
(02:03):
And at that time, the chair of the Board
of Governors was a governor, a good friendof ours, a guy by the name of Ron Bloom.
His term has since ended, sohe's no longer a governor.
But they worked together to develop a plan
that would play out overthe next ten years or so.
And the purpose of that plan was to put
(02:23):
the Postal Service on a sustainablefinancial path to protect service and even
expand, in a lot of cases, the servicethat we provide to our customers.
Sowe are not in a place where I'm going to
say that we have agreed with100% of every bit of that plan.
But it was refreshing in a general sense
(02:47):
compared to what we had seen really forthe last decade plus, where that was
leadership at the Postal Service thatreally wanted to try to cut their way into
sustainability by reducing service andfurther slowing down the mail and all
sorts of things that justnever made any sense.
So the plan was a work in progressfor a while but then was released.
(03:10):
They call it the Delivering for America
plan and there are pieces of theplan that have already happened.
One piece, maybe most notably is a
legislative piece wherewe working with the Postal Service as well
as the other stakeholders were able towork with members of Congress and the
White House to pass really monumentallegislation that reformed the Postal
(03:33):
Service called the PostalReform Act of 2021.
That bill was signed into law in2022 and it did three main things.
Number one, it repealed a mandate that had
been in place since 2006 for the PostalService to pre fund future retiree health
benefits that was costing them anywherefrom five to $6 billion a year.
(03:55):
And it's an obligation that no othercompany in America, public or private had.
It also, at a higher rate, integrated
Medicare with retiree,healthcare for postal retirees.
If you go back a few episodes ago, we
talked about that Medicareintegration in detail.
So you can listen to that ifyou're curious about that.
(04:18):
It also made six day delivery a permanent
part of the law and those key componentsof that legislation are part of this plan.
So that was a really good way to start it.
As far as what I think we'll really dive
into today are what the portionsof the plan that we are seeing.
And that has to do with realigning andmodifying and modernizing, hopefully the
(04:43):
Postal Services processingand delivery network.
And I'll start kind of in a general sense
and then, Eddie, I'm sure as we goforward, we'll get into more details.
But basicallythere's a recognition that our model of
processing and delivering mailwas created in a time where the vast, vast
(05:07):
majority of the mail that we handledand delivered were letters and flats.
And over time the mix of mail has changed.
I mean, all letter carriers know wedeliver way more parcels than we used to.
We handle fewer letters and flats,particularly in the office.
For us on office time we don't case thatmuch mail anymore compared to years past.
(05:32):
So you have a network that was built to
handle letters and flats when we'renow handling far, far more parcels.
So from a processing perspective, it is
modernizing to meet the demands of themail mix that we see now and then as we'll
get into in depth here in a few minutes onthe delivery side, trying to ensure that
(05:55):
we can be in a place where, from adelivery perspective, we're able to get
mail to carriers early and be able toprovide the service that we need to
provide out there withthe modern mix of mail.
So that's the piece thatI think we'll focus on.
There were other pieces of the plan thathave already happened one of which I'll
(06:17):
point out that's notable that we did notsupport and that was a modification to
service standards incertain geographic areas.
So in the past we had a two to three daystandard on first class mail going coast
to coast that was modified,I guess almost two years ago now, to be
(06:38):
increased from three to fourdays as opposed to two to three.
And the postal service's reasoning for
doing that was that they simply wereunable to make the two to three day
standard if we go back toCOVID looking in 2020.
During that peak season, we had a lot ofdifficulty with delays in the mail and
(07:00):
some of that was due tocapacity on airlines.
So the reason for this change was thatthey were able to take all first class
mail off of planes and moveit to ground transportation.
So even a letter going from the Northeast
to Southern California now travels byground transportation and their reasoning
(07:23):
behind it was, look, we have a two tothree day standard we can't make because
we're trying to put this mail onplanes that don't have the capacity.
So we'll move it to the ground and asopposed to having a two to three day
standard at taking a week to get there,we'll have a three to four day standard
and it will actually makeit in three to four days.
And I have to say that
(07:43):
in retrospect, while we have never andwill never support slowing the mail down
from the standard, they have madethat standard since it's been made.
They changed it to a threeto four day standard.
So the performance there has been muchbetter since that change went into play.
So that's one of the earlychanges that we did not support.
(08:06):
Really what we'll get into today is what
they're doing on thedelivery side of the house.
What affects us some movement of carriers.
That it's not really a matter ofwhether we support it or not.
It's more a matter of how we're able toenforce our collective bargaining
agreement and ensure that as they takethese type actions that we make it the
(08:27):
best we possibly can for the lettercarriers that are impacted by it and
obviously, ultimately, the servicethat we provide to our customers.
So I'm sure we'll get a little more in
depth on the S and DC sideof the house here shortly.
Were we consulted with this plan?
Yeah, we were involved from a veryearly stage in conversations.
(08:50):
In fact, there's a lot of pieces of the
plan that at some point or another were inlet's call it draft form or even maybe
conceptual that wethought were a bad idea.
We voiced that and those thingsultimately did not make it into the plan.
So yes, we've been very involvedin this from the beginning.
(09:14):
It's something that I give them a lot ofcredit for their communication with us.
There were things that were in some ways
left over from previous leadership at thePostal Service that were just bad ideas.
And that mostly included service cuts andstuff like that, reducing retail locations
(09:36):
and closing post officesand things like that.
I think through that communication we
expressed the real problems with a lot ofthose things and ultimately we're able to
keep those things frombecoming a part of the plan.
When I say keep them from becoming a part
of the plan, it's just more aboutcommunication and the understanding that
(09:59):
the folks over in leadership at the PostalService gain, through conversations with
us that not do things in a plan thatwould end up harming.
If indeed the goal was what they stated,to modernize and provide that service.
Anything that would negatively impact our
ability to do that, we were able to talkthrough and get a lot of that removed.
(10:24):
So the plan itself in its currentstate is there was no surprises to us.
There are things that we had communicatedabout all along and been preparing for.
So yeah, we were definitely involved and
I have to give thema good deal of credit compared to maybe
what we've seen over at LaFonte Plaza inyears past, that there was very open lines
(10:48):
of communication and the same iscontinued as we see this implemented.
Can you explain what an S and DC is?Yeah.
So this is the piece of the plan that we
are seeing and dealing with morethan anything else on a daily basis.
So S and DC stands forSorting and delivery centers.
(11:08):
And the conceptjust to explain in a general sense, and
then we'll get into alittle bit more detail.
If you take a city the way the Postal
Services processing and delivery networkis set up, you will have multiple mail
processing facilities and thendozens, if not more delivery units.
(11:32):
And in each of those delivery units you
would have from each processing location,you have these truck routes.
In some cases, those arepostal employees running trucks.
In a lot of cases, they'recontractors that are transporting mail
(11:53):
from processing locationsto delivery units.
They may stop at a number of delivery
units along the way, and then also in theevening and at night, they're bringing
mail back from the delivery unitsto the processing locations.
In general, what they are doing isreducing the number of processing
(12:13):
locations but expandingthe capacity to process.
So let's say, for example, you have in a
particular metropolitan areaseven mail processing locations.
They may reduce that to two or threelocations, but actually increase the
capacity to process becausethey're in much larger locations.
(12:35):
On the delivery side of things, they have
identified places to create these sortingand Delivery centers, or S and DCs.
And what they do with an S and DC is movea number of different delivery units.
And there's certain criteriathat they get into.
And I'm sure we'll get intothat a little more in a minute.
(12:56):
But they move certain deliveryunits into these S and DCS.
So you've got a whole bunchof carriers in one location.
And what that does is reduce the amount oftransportation of mail, be it by postal
employees or contractors, in a lot ofcases, between the mail processing
facilities or locationsand delivery units.
(13:17):
Now you've just got a whole bunch of mailgoing to one place in an S and DC, and
then the transportation is essentiallytransferred from whatever the
transportation route wasonto the carrier's route.
So in most cases, once a delivery unit
moves to an S and DC, a carrier is goingto leave there and have to travel some
distance to get out tobegin their first delivery.
(13:42):
By reducing that transportation and movingit on to carrier routes,
combined with increasing the capacity toprocess mail,
the vision here is to create a more stablenetwork with a larger capacity that
has fewer variables in terms of thethings that affect us every day.
(14:04):
So we all know we've been at work in themorning, in the office and a truck's late
or one little thing gets out of kilter andall of a sudden we're waiting on our mail
and everything's behind and weall know how that cycle goes.
And the idea here is to grow thatcapacity, but then also to decrease
the possibility for that happening to havemore consistent processing and
(14:28):
transportation which ultimately, hopefullyresults in more consistent delivery.
So a sorting and delivery center is alocation where they have moved multiple
delivery units into a single locationwhere mail will be transported from the
processing facility anddistributed to the carriers.
(14:49):
How are they deciding wherethese things are going to go?
Yeah, there's a lot of different factors.
They try to one, for example, is they tryto keep them within a
30 minutes transportation fromwhere the routes originally were.
If you look at a big map
(15:10):
in pretty much every metropolitan area inthe country, they've identified locations
where they canwithin 30 minutes maximize the number of
delivery units they canget into one S and DC.
And there's other things that we look at.
Some of the services we want to expand in
the future, such as same day delivery andsome of the local connect and some of the
(15:35):
other services that wereally want to see grow.
There's some market analysis that they use
in terms of where potential revenueand mail volume could come from.
That's all a piece of it too, but for themost part it's kind of plotting on a map
with criteria based on obviously where themail processing locations are as well.
(15:59):
So some of it's due to availability offacilities and sometimes that's existing
postal facilities, in some cases theygo lease or buy other facilities.
So there's a number of differentfactors that play into it.
But there's been a lot of communicationabout how they make those decisions here
(16:19):
over the last really, I guessyear and a half or so now.
How many are they going to do?
There's a little bit of an evolution thattakes place here, but right now over the
course of this ten year plan, which has, Iguess a little over eight years
left, they are looking at somewhere in theneighborhood of 400 of these S and DCs.
(16:43):
We are not close to having 400 of them.
We're just with I think a coupleof dozen or so out there now.
But we've definitely every few monthswe've got several more that are scheduled
to come online and later on today we'llget more in detail about what we do as far
as NALC internally to try to prepare andgain information and anticipate issues
(17:08):
that may come upand address those ahead of time.
Are they contractuallyallowed to move us like this?
Yeah.So there is no contractual prohibition
really on the Postal Servicemoving anybody anywhere.
When it comes to things, we have toremember is they own these facilities and
(17:30):
the Postal Service has their routeand have over time
relocated work locations and moveroutes and things like that.
I think where the contractual piece comesin this is very important for us is based
on the nature or the factcircumstances of a particular move.
(17:51):
We have contractual provisions that apply.
The majority of that is going to be found
in Article Twelve of ourcollective bargaining agreement.
In Article Twelve,
section One C, one, Two and three, there'sa number of different scenarios that are
covered there that if that is a scenariothat they choose to move
(18:15):
a location that fits into one of thosescenarios, there's lots of provisions
there that do things like protectseniority and stuff like that.
This particular case,
these S and DCs are a little different andthey're similar to something we've dealt
with for over a decade now called DeliveryUnit Optimization where they are moving
(18:37):
all the carriers from one location toanother, but the post office where they
move them from, what we call thelosing installation remains open.
So that's not something that is clearly
covered by ArticleTwelve of our agreement.
So we negotiated back, signed back inJanuary of this year, a couple of
(18:57):
different memorandums ofunderstanding that cover that.
I think those M numbers, if you want to
look in our materials reference systemon the website are M 1990 and M 1991.
That covers some specifics that the postal
Service has to follow whenever theymove folks into these locations.
I read the Postal Recordarticle about the plan.
(19:19):
Can you explain the gaining andlosing installation language?
Yeah, so the losing installation is wherethe assignments are being moved from and
the gaining installation will bethat sorting and Delivery center.
So in M 1990, which is an MoU that wenegotiated and signed back in January of
(19:40):
this year, there's a lot of differentrules that are laid out there.
In fact, there's 13 different items in
that agreement that talksabout what will happen.
It talks about how seniority and bidassignments, how we deal with those.
It gets into what happens to hold downsand temporary higher level assignments
(20:04):
under Article 25, section Four, it getsinto what happens with annual leave
request and what happenswith route adjustments.
Obviously, when you move routes, you're
moving them to a place, and in a lot ofcases we're adding travel time to them.
So these agreements coverhow we deal with that in the short term
and then eventually how weevaluate and adjust those routes.
(20:26):
So there's a lot of different if you readthat Postal Record article, we covered a
number of these things and we'll get intoit a little more in depth of how we deal
with each specific locationdifferently a little bit later on.
Butthe gaining is going to be the
installation that's createdwhere the S and DC is typically that's
(20:47):
going to be moved into an existinginstallation, and then the losing
installation will be wherethe routes move from.
And throughout that agreement in M 1990,you'll see those two terms used a lot that
reference both installationsthat are involved.
I love my Stewart.
Are they going to come with me?Yeah.
Part of moving into these S and DCs, and
(21:10):
part of the agreement I just talkedabout is that all carriers move.
So all routes move.
There's no moving some and not others.
So that makes this different than
some movement we see pursuant to ArticleTwelve, in some cases we see movement
that's not necessitated by the PostalService wanting to move people.
(21:33):
Sometimes it can be necessitated by having
too many people in one location,what we call an excess of employees.
And in that case it's seniority based and
there is something for stewardscalled super seniority.
But in the case of movement withan S and DC, all the carriers go.
So everybody that's there with you and allthose routes will move to the S and DC.
(21:56):
If you're involved.
What happens to my senioritylist and my seniority?
Everybody maintains theirseniority when you are moved.
That's one of the specific things that we
covered in the agreement that wenegotiated is everybody retains their
craft installation seniorityand their bid assignment.
(22:17):
So you stay on your routeand for the purposes of the way you accrue
seniority, this is covered, I believe, inArticle 41, section Two, B seven,
you're considered to have gained all thatseniority in the gaining instllation.
So where you are in the S and DC.
(22:37):
What happens with theovertime Equitability list?
Is it just for the people I cameover with or the whole new building?
The short answer is that depends.
It can be the entire building that's going
to be subject towhether your local Memorandum of
understanding divides thatinstallation by section.
(23:02):
When you move into a location, many timesyou'll have multiple local memorandums of
understanding from each of theplaces that are moving in.
And there's a process that's laid out inthat Moum 1991 that talks about that.
So it depends on what those Lmous sayand ultimately depends on what language.
(23:24):
Once we reconcile those Lmous through a
process that we have and we'll get intothat a little bit more in a little while.
Do I have to work overtime in anunfamiliar zip code or route?
Question is kind of similar tothe question about overtime.
Equitability.The answer is maybe.
So these are combined into one
(23:44):
installation once wemove into an S and DC.
So absent language, otherwise in an Lmou,if you're on the overtime desired list,
then you would be considered availablefor all the routes there.
But again, that's subject to what the
Lmou, how it divides, if it divides initem 18, that installation by section.
(24:09):
How is this good for my route?
Well, what we've found in the ones that we
have had implemented so far,know, most routes gain travel time.
So you're gaining travel time from the newS and DC to your first delivery and then
from your last deliveryback to the S and DC.
And then once we evaluate the routes andget them adjusted, for the most part we're
(24:33):
trading delivery, know, forjust simple travel time.
And for most folks that is a positive
thing that we're just riding in a vehiclefor a few and it ranges from anywhere to
it could be just a few minutes, up to 2030minutes or so a day in each direction.
It just depends on the geographicsof a particular location.
(24:56):
Sothe feedback and the response from most
folks has been positive in that regardthat trading off some delivery time for
travel time is definitely a littleeasier and better for the carrier.
What happens with my branches Lmou?
Yeah, so the agreement I mentioned in theMrs, it's M 1991, it includes a process
(25:21):
where if you have multiple installationsthat are involved,
basically the parties get together and tryto resolve any differences in the Lmou.
So if you have multiple Lmous from the
losing installations that are combined andthere are differences there,
(25:44):
I think it's important to note this isseparate and apart from normal Article 30
local implementation that we have after weget a new collective bargaining agreement,
those issues are talked about by therepresentatives at the local level.
Those would be obviously the branch
presidents that are involvedin the installation head.
(26:06):
And then there's a resolution processfor any issues that are not resolved.
They go up tothe national business agent and they also
go up to the postal services,field labor relations folks.
And then if they can't resolve something,
it'll come here to thenational level for resolution.
One thing to note, and I don't foresee
(26:29):
this happening anytime soon, butanything's possible in the event once this
process is done in the event, at somepoint in the future, these
locations in an S and DC arereturned to their original location.
Then the original
Know is basically reinstated as ifit had never been changed.
(26:52):
Sothat's the process,
and it's just to resolve anydifferences that may conflict.
If we're not in an S and DC yet, are we
going to have to change somelanguage when our Lmou opens up?
No, there'd be no requirement for that.
If you are not currentlyif you have not been moved to an S and DC,
(27:17):
then there's nothing that wouldrequire you to open your Lmou.
I mean, obviously, through the normal
Article 30 local implementationprocess, you could do that.
And I'm sure at whatever point local
implementation happens, which will be herein the next few months, at some point,
those locations that we know werescheduled to move into an S and DC.
(27:40):
We'll definitely keep that in mind, andwe'll get into a little more detail in a
few minutes about what our internalprocess is and the things that we look at.
So I guess it's possible that we may,during that local implementation period,
if we know we have things that areinevitable where we're going to move and
we're able to resolve somethings, then we may do that.
(28:01):
But there's nothing that will require you
to make any changes unless youare involved in an S and DC.
And there are differences in the Lmous of
the routes from the Losing installations,Lmous that are moved into the S and DCs.
If there are differences, yes,you have to resolve that.
(28:23):
Butthere's no requirement that anything else
be changed during normallocal implementation.
So the last few questions weretalking a little bit know branch.
So here's, let's get back totheir rank and file carrier.
Where do my customers pick up their mailor parcel when I have to leave a notice?
Yeah.So what happens in the S and DCs?
(28:45):
Remember that when the carriers move
the location, you move from the losinginstallation, that Post Office stays open.
So if there's a windowthere, it's still open.
So what we do is, at the end of the day,
whatever you would bring back, be that apiece of mail, something you left notice
for and accountable, whateverthe case may be a parcel.
(29:07):
You bring it back to the S and DC,
and then the following morning,one of the carriers.
And sometimes it's the carrier who'sthe post office is on their route.
Sometimes it may be another carrier.
That stuff will be given to thatcarrier to drop off at the Post Office.
(29:28):
So it doesn't change where acustomer has to go get their mail.
So if you have an accountable pieceof mail, you leave a notice for it.
That customer is going to go to thesame place that they've always gone to.
So that was one of the big pieces of this,
that while moving us, these S and DCs wedefinitely didn't want to inconvenience
(29:48):
customers by having themtravel further to get their stuff.
So from their perspective, it'll all be atthat same location where it's always been.
How does that notifiedmail piece get there?
Yeah, one of the carriers the next morning
will take everything for that particularstation or finance unit is really what it
(30:11):
is at that point,and bring it out and drop it off.
So anything that was noticedwas left for the day before.
Then that customer will be ableto go there and pick it up.
All right, well, we have a special guest
going to come in and Brad, doyou want to introduce him?
So we've been talking about S and DCStoday, and I'd like for us to spend a
(30:33):
little bit of time tolet you all know what we NALC here at the
national level and we'll get into alsowhat we do at the regional level and the
branch level doing preparationfor each of these S and DCS.
And here to help me with that, who does a
lot of work in that regard, is oneof our letter carrier staffers.
(30:56):
He is special assistant tothe president, Doug Lape.
So, Doug, welcome.Thank you, Brian.
Appreciate it.
Before we get into this stuff, why don'tyou just tell us briefly a little bit
about yourself and where you'refrom and all that stuff.
I know, but I think they'dbe interested to know.
Sure.
So I'm a letter carrier out ofBranch 43 in Cincinnati, Ohio.
(31:18):
I've been with the PostalService since 1996.
Started as a clerk, decided I didn't wantto be inside all day when it was 95
degrees or 2ft of snow onthe ground in Cincinnati.
So in 1998, I switched over to carrying.
Coming up on my 25th year.
So October 10 of thisyear will be 25 years.
Worked as a union activist inBranch 43 for a long time.
(31:41):
Became Vice Presidentof my branch in 2011.
And then in 2017, I came up here to
headquarters as an assistant to thePresident working in City Delivery.
Yeah.And Doug's done a great job and he worked
in City Delivery for a few years and forthe last, I guess about a year now, he's
worked a lot with me and a couple othersthere on a number of different projects.
(32:07):
And one of Doug's main things is dealingwith the sorting and delivery centers.
So we get notice from the Postal Service
and communication that know, hey, in suchand such month we intend to move these
places into this newlyestablished S and DC.
And from that point forward, we start a
(32:27):
process of communication with the branchand through the regional offices
to really just try to gather all theinformation we can possibly gather.
And once we gather all that information,we try to anticipate any issues that may
be specific to that locationand try to resolve those issues.
(32:47):
But Doug.Why don't we start there?
And once we get that notification and weknow that these places are going to move
to this new s and DC, why don't you justtalk us through a little bit of what you
do, working with each of the NBA officesand reaching out to the branches in terms
of gathering that information and tryingto identify issues that we may have.
(33:09):
Absolutely.
So we meet with the Postal Service everyother week on the S and DC initiative.
We get the list of the potential sites
that are going to be implemented, and wehave three implementation dates per year
one in February, 1 in June,and one in September.
After we get that list, we then take these
(33:30):
losing installations and determineif there's an impact to our craft.
To do that, we look and see how many citycarriers and how many routes actually
exist in the S and DC andin the losing installation.
Some of these officeshave no impact to us.
For example, our first office, the Athens
(33:50):
S and DC, there were city carriers alreadyworking in the building, and all of the
city carriers that were there beforeimplementation still worked there.
No city carriers were moved in.
It was all rural.
So after we've determined that there isgoing to be an impact, meaning there are
going to be city carriers moved into anS and DC, what we do is we reach out to
(34:11):
each NBA and we startasking for information.
We want to verify that what we've beentold by the Postal Service is correct.
We want to know the number of routesthat exist in the losing office.
We want to know the number of routes thatexist in the S and DC, and we want to know
the branches that represent each one,because we like to have as much
communication as possible with both thebusiness agents offices and the branches.
(34:36):
So what that means is, once we've gathered
all of that information, determined howmany offices are going to be moved into
the S and DC, how many city carrier routesare going to move, we set up meetings with
the business agents offices and theregions or the regions and the branches,
so we can sit down and explainto them what's going on.
There are right now threemodels in the S and DC.
(35:00):
There is a model where all of the routes
in an installation are moved from thelosing installation into the S and DC.
That is the process that's covered under M
1990 and M 1991, which I thinkyou talked about earlier.
The second process is where they movedelivery units within an installation.
(35:21):
For example, in Topeka, Kansas, in June of
this year, they implemented an S and DC,and the only offices that were moved were
delivery units withinthe Topeka installation.
That's something which is not reallycovered by the National Agreement.
The Postal Service has the right to move
their delivery unitswithin an installation.
There's no impact toseniority bid assignments.
(35:42):
Lmous, because they all work in the sameinstallation before and after the
establishment of the S and DC, there'sreally nothing that needs to be done other
than explaining to the carrierswhat's going to happen.
The third situation is a little bit more
unique, and that's where they take onedelivery unit from an installation and
(36:02):
move it into thejurisdiction of an S and DC.
For example, back in June of this year,
the Hanover Park, Illinois S and DC wasestablished, and one delivery unit from
the Elgin, Illinois installation wasmoved out of Elgin into Hanover Park.
So once we've determined the S and DC
(36:24):
locations, the losing installations, andwhether there's an impact of the craft, we
determine how thosecarriers are being moved.
So we want to sit down and talk to thebranches and explain to them this is the
process that covers this movement, just tomake sure they understand all the rules.
Whether it's under M 1990 and 1991,whether it's under Article Twelve, which
(36:48):
is the circumstance like in Hanover Park,Illinois, or whether it's just the
movement of delivery unitswithin installation.
Yeah.
As you might imagine, just based oneverything Doug just talked about when
you've got now we're up to,what are we, 20 something?
We're at twelve right now, but we havemore offices coming online the beginning.
(37:10):
Of September that we knoware sort of in process.
And then in each of those you haveanywhere from it may just be two or three
installations that are moving in, oryou may have up to an unlimited number.
So there's quite a bit of workthat goes in there.
So we try to do that, and then Dougcommunicates with the postal service.
(37:34):
As far as issues that we see, Doug, I wantto touch on a couple of other things that
we have to deal with, and that issometimes we only have like, a single
branch involved here where placesfrom one single branch move in.
And in that case,
it's pretty straightforward asfar as the representation piece.
But then other times we have multiple
(37:55):
branches and part of theinformation that we gather.
And then when that's the case, ultimately
I have to make a decision as to what therepresentation there will look like.
And that's something, I think, early on in
this process, that we startto gather information.
(38:15):
I know you have a lot of communication
with the branches that are potentiallyinvolved, and we try to figure out the
best thing to do when itcomes to representation too
Right, So as I said earlier, we sit down
and talk to the brancheswith the regional offices.
It's a little bit easier when we'retalking about one branch that represents
all of the carriers that are moving intothe S and DC, as well as the S and DC.
(38:38):
It gets a little more complicatedwhen we have multiple branches.
The example I gave aboutHanover Park, Illinois.
There were two branches involved one thatrepresented the carriers in the delivery
unit from Elgin and one that representedthe carriers in Hanover Park.
We've had other circumstances, such as in
Bryan, Texas, where there's been multiplebranches, utica, New York, which has had
(39:01):
three branches now thatcoexist within the S and DC.
So we have to explain
all of this to every branch so theyunderstand how this is going to work.
They understand the Lmou issues that they
need to discuss,which involves more than just one person,
one branch president talking tothe postmaster of the S and DC.
(39:23):
We need to make sure they understandeverything that's going to happen and how
their branch is going to beimpacted by this change.
Yeah.
And it kind of goes back to the wholeprinciple that we've used since the
beginning of this, is there are thingsthat each of these have in common, but
they all are also unique based on anumber of different circumstances.
(39:44):
It can be anything.
Sometimes it's geography,where we have locations that move, and you
have challenges createdby the amount of travel that they have
from the new S and DC orthe routes that are available to them as
far as traveling to andfrom their first delivery.
Another piece I wanted to hit on thatdefinitely everyone that's moved into one
(40:10):
of these S and DCs will be impacted by,and that is the process in M 1990 for
evaluating and adjusting theroutes because they're impacted.
And there's kind of a little interim thing
that we do initially and then ultimatelythere's a route adjustment piece that
happens post actualmovement into the location.
(40:32):
So why don't you describe kind of what
that process looks like, both initiallywhat we do in advance and then what
happens a few weeks after wemove into those locations.
Right.So one of the big things that we discussed
both internally and with the PostalService is how do we make any sort of
(40:54):
arrangements for the fact that thesecarriers are going to have potentially
more travel time when theymove into the S and DC.
And what we're talking about is whenyou're at your original delivery unit, you
may have had a certain amount of time toget from your office to your first
delivery point and then fromyour last delivery point back.
(41:14):
Once that route moves to the S and DC,there could be an additional travel time.
So you're going to have more time to get
from the S and DC to your firstdelivery and more time to drive back.
At the end of the day, what we tried to dois come up with a way, and I think we did
it in M 1990 is for the national partieswho are involved in the joint route
adjustment process to sit down andestimate the time that it's going to take
(41:39):
that carrier to get totheir first delivery.
And then back once they'vefinished their route.
Keep in mind, this is only an estimate.
It is not an exact.
There's no way to get the exact numbers
until somebody actuallydrives it on a regular basis.
But we wanted to make it clear to bothlocal management and the letter carrier
serving the route that we all acknowledgethat there's been an impact to your route.
(42:04):
We know there's more traveltime on a daily basis.
So that route, which may have been 8 hoursbefore it moved, could potentially be
eight and a half, 845,whatever that number is.
So that was the first part of it that wedid before the movement of the S and DC.
So before about 30 days before
the routes actually move, the postmasterand the branch president or their
(42:29):
designees will sit down and explain toevery carrier on their route, this is what
the national parties have agreed, this isthe new estimated time for your route.
Yeah.And the idea is just simply to
there's a fine line, I guess, between sortof projecting what it'll look like, but in
this case, we're not really projectingwell, we're not projecting delivery time.
(42:54):
We can come reasonably close to figuring
out how long it takes to travelfrom one point to another.
So the idea is that there be a recognition
among everybody, local management as wellas the carriers, of what that change is.
And then we use our joint route adjustment
process, once they're implemented,to evaluate and adjust them.
(43:18):
So if you're in one ofthese new S and DCs.
Chances are you probably have seen Doug,
because I think he's visitedall of them as we go forward.
He'll continue to do that, know a number
of our other staff here at headquarters,as well as several of the officers, and
know folks from your national businessagents office will be out there.
(43:41):
The important thing for us is just to doeverything we can to ensure that we have
the right amount of communication, that wegain the information that we need to do
what's best for each oneof these individual sites.
And ultimately, when it comes to the
representation side, any decision that wemake here, and I'm speaking for myself
(44:04):
here, we're going to make the decisionthat's in the best interest of the members
that are impacted thereand their representation.
Doug, is there anything else related to
S and DCS that you think would beuseful for the listeners to think?
You know, as Brian mentioned, I do getout and I travel to all these S and DCS.
(44:27):
There's a lot of construction going on in
these facilities because once they'redone, they all look the same, they have
the same color scheme, they all havenew cases, which is a blue case.
And I'll tell you, as I said, I'vebeen in the Postal Service since 1996.
November of last year was the first time
I'd ever seen a case thatwas less than 30 years old.
(44:48):
So they are doing somethings that are nice.
They are remodeling all of the bathrooms,new fixtures they're putting in, new water
fountains that have waterbottle fillers and filters.
Every office is getting an ice machine,not just the offices that may work in the
more hot and humid or those places thathave a little bit hotter temperatures.
(45:14):
So I think we need to be cognizant ofthe fact that nobody likes the change.
People like to stay where they're at.
But at the end of the day, thesefacilities do look a lot nicer.
Some of them are being cleaned for the
first time in years,which is always a positive.
And I think the reason we really want toget out and see these offices is, as I
(45:35):
mentioned at the very beginning, that wedo meet with the postal service every two
weeks, and they tell us thestatus of these offices.
And brian, from the very beginning, hasmade the decision that we're going to get
out there, and we're going to see ifwhat we're being told is accurate.
And it really does open your eyes when you
get into these offices, instead of justlooking at a single picture in a
(45:56):
PowerPoint presentation to see what theissues are so that we can address those
with the postal service and getthem fixed as quickly as possible.
Yeah, I know this will shock everyone
that's listening, but early on inparticular, we found a lot of places where
they'd show us some beautiful picture, andwe'd go out there, and the bathrooms
(46:18):
weren't working orwhatever the case may be.
And hopefully that's gotten
I think that's probably gotten a littlebit better, but that just kind of
highlights the importanceof the communication.
When we've had this communication, and
those issues have been raised by our folkslocally or at the regional level,
we have had very good success in terms ofgetting those things addressed up here.
(46:43):
So the s and DCs, as Dougmentioned, any movement?
We are kind of creatures of habit, and we
don't like change, but there arepositives, and he mentioned several of
them that come alongwith this in terms of the amenities.
And it just
may take, in a lot of cases, a littlebit longer to get there for some people.
(47:03):
But usually when it comes to the buildingitself, once all the construction and that
stuff's completed, they aredefinitely better places to work.
Well, Doug, thanks so much for joining us.
We appreciate all the work you'redoing out there on the S and DCs.
And for those of you thatare involved in S and DCs.
In the near future, there's a goodchance that you'll get to meet them.
(47:25):
So thanks for joining us.
All right, thank you.
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