We have been hearing an increasing number of stories about mail being “dumped.” Not good, but can this be seen as frustration over the changes made by Louis DeJoy that have deliberately slowed the processing and delivery of mail? And why would a Republican mega-donor like DeJoy be seen as “qualified” to run the Post Office? Why shouldn’t we expect that the changes he--and the USPS board comprised entirely of Donald Trump appointees--has instituted would be deliberately designed to effect election ballots, despite the claims made by DeJoy during his Congressional hearings? And why should anyone have taken his word that he was going to “reverse” changes that effected mail and ballot delivery?
It has been clear for some time that the changes made by DeJoy did not create greater “efficiency,” but exactly the opposite. With the release of the USPS Inspector General report earlier this week, we discover that the changes made by the board and overseen by DeJoy were made arbitrarily and without concern about how they would effect the efficient delivery of mail, let alone ballots. In fact, we can assume that this was (there is that word again) deliberately done by Trump’s surrogates at USPS to disrupt the counting of ballots and claim”fraud”; after all, isn’t this what Trump has been claiming would happen for months?
And why did the board and DeJoy institute such policies right in the middle of this pandemic, of all times? Because they knew that more people would choose to vote by mail. Do we have to have our heads in the sand on this issue? Even Trump supporters know it is true, and this is exactly what they want to happen, because of the assumption that more people would vote, and most them would be allegedly vote Democratic.
Here are some excerpts from the IG report:
On May 6, 2020, the Postal Service’s Board of Governors announced its selection of Louis DeJoy to serve as the 75th Postmaster General. In his remarks at an August 7, 2020, Board of Governors meeting, Mr. DeJoy announced implementation of an organizational realignment and noted that the Postal Service’s financial position was dire, stemming from substantial declines in mail volume, a broken business model, and a management strategy that has not adequately addressed these issues. Given the current situation, he noted it was critical that the Postal Service review operations and make necessary adjustments.
In June and July 2020, Postal Service operations executives initiated various significant cost reduction strategies on top of three initiatives the Postmaster General launched to achieve financial targets. No analysis of the service impacts of these various changes was conducted and documentation and guidance to the field for these strategies was very limited and almost exclusively oral. The resulting confusion and inconsistency in operations at postal facilities compounded the significant negative service impacts across the country.
The report noted the irregular and unprecedented degree of actions, which effected efficiency and the on-time delivery of mail, that had been implemented without prior consideration or study--basically a hack-job that we can assume were for reasons other than “cost-cutting.”
One of the 57 initiatives – the removal of mail processing equipment – was in progress prior to July 2020, but the pace of removals was accelerated beginning n June 2020. Specifically, removal of letter and flat processing machines across the country increased from an average of 375 removals a year from FY 2015 to FY 2019. Between October 2019 and August of 2020, 712 letter and flat processing machines were reduced – 437 (61 percent) of these machines were removed from June to August 2020, and 325 of these were Delivery Barcode Sorters. We also noted that while removing under-utilized collection boxes occurs each year based on an annual density study, collection box removals significantly exceeded the average annual removals in two of the seven geographic areas of the country in July 2020.
While the Postal Service estimated workhour savings for many of the initiatives, it did not complete a study or analysis of the impact the changes would make on mail service prior to implementation. Further, the Postal Service did not pilot test or otherwise consider the impact of the changes even though critical employee availability issues were being felt as pandemic cases rose following the July 4 holiday weekend. Lastly, we noted that these initiatives were implemented quickly and were communicated primarily orally, which resulted in confusion and inconsistent application across the country.
The collective results of these initiatives, combined with the ongoing employee availability challenges resulting from the pandemic, negatively impacted the quality and timeliness of mail delivery nationally. The Postal Service’s mail service performance significantly dropped beginning in July 2020, directly corresponding to implementation of the operational changes and initiatives. Most notably, service performance indicators declined significantly in July 2020, for all mail products we reviewed.
Contrary to DeJoy’s “assurances” before Congress, USPS is still, just days before the election, not processing election mail with the speed as occurred prior to the changes he made. Despite multi-state lawsuits and court orders blocking and reversing the changes made, the delivery rate of USPS mail is still today down lower than at any point in 2020. In “swing” states in particular, on-time deliveries are down 10 percent or more; in Detroit, only 71 percent of mail is being delivered on-time. Directives on the handling of ballots have been said to be “chaotic.” and in Michigan, postal workers have been told to prioritize packages over ballot delivery. In Pennsylvania, some district managers continue to ignore court orders to reverse changes and allow overtime.
In the swing state of Wisconsin, the Wisconsin Examiner reported that “Sen. Tammy Baldwin wrote that postal employees have told her office that ‘the Postal Service continues to engage in practices that delay mail, in violation of court orders.’ Milwaukee postal workers have told her that ‘certain managers are pressuring employees to continue sending out trucks, even if it means leaving mail behind,’ Baldwin wrote. They have also reported that not all the automatic sorting machines that had been removed from service have been reconnected for use.”
It is clear that in order to stop Trump and his underlings from undermining the election like any power mad dictator seeking to remain in office to avoid the consequences of his crimes, people need to vote now. Nothing can be left to chance in this election.
No comments:
Post a Comment