ATLANTA — The U.S. Postal Service will pause major network changes until 2025, Postmaster General Louis DeJoy has pledged in a letter to lawmakers.
The pause, primarily focused on nearly 60 mail processing facilities around the country that have been undergoing reviews, comes after significant delivery delays and processing disruptions followed network consolidations in Atlanta and elsewhere.
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The changes began as USPS started implementing a 10-year system modernization drive called "Delivery for America," which is also intended to significant reduce operating costs.
Postmaster General DeJoy's letter was addressed to Michigan Sen. Gary Peters, who had expressed concern about a processing facility's operations being moved across state lines to Green Bay, Wisconsin. But Peters was joined in a letter last week signed by 21 other senators in calling for a pause to major network changes.
Sen. Peters, in a release, said that letter had called on USPS "to stop the facility and transportation changes in its network plan until they can be studied to ensure they will not harm mail delivery service."
DeJoy, in his response, asserted the concerns are at least in part based on "misconceptions" about the 10-year plan and "conflated with some current service issues we are experiencing." The postmaster general said the pause will halt $430 million in system investments and delay an estimated $133-177 million in annual cost savings.
"You have been hearing from fellow Senators about changes being made at processing plants in their home states, which your colleagues feel have the potential to adversely impact service in their states and especially locally," DeJoy wrote to Sen. Peters, who chairs the Senate Homeland Security & Government Affairs Committee, where a fiery hearing was held last month at which the postmaster general faced withering scrutiny by Georgia Sen. Jon Ossoff and others. "We do not see these planned actions as at all consequential to service; rather, they are important elements of achieving a network that can provide greater service reliability in a cost-effective manner."
DeJoy's full letter is available at the bottom of this article.
11Alive's Liza Lucas was at the Capitol in D.C. for the hearing, at which Peters first asked for the pause. Georgia's issues featured centrally in the proceedings.
The postmaster general further said in his letter to Peters that, "I acknowledge that we have not been able to convince Congress of this, even though these efforts will both improve the facilities and facilitate the significant cost reductions that we absolutely must achieve to have any hope of financial sustainability."
Peters, in a statement, said he appreciated the postmaster general's "efforts to work with me on this issue" but that he still has "concerns about additional changes, including to local transportation trips."
"I urge the Postal Service to pause and reverse local transportation changes in addition to facility changes, until we have more information about their effects," Peters said. "I will continue to push for a comprehensive study by the Postal Regulatory Commission to ensure any changes implemented do not impact mail delivery. It’s absolutely critical that we understand the full scope of these changes, as well as their impact on service and communities, before moving forward.”
The delays in Atlanta trace to the new Atlanta Regional Processing & Distribution Center in Palmetto. It opened on Feb. 24, consolidating Atlanta, Augusta, Macon and Duluth area processing and distribution centers, which are each being repurposed as local processing centers.
Atlanta, following on Richmond, Virginia, was one of the first regional areas to see major network changes.
Among lawmakers, Georgia Sen. Jon Ossoff has been unsparing in his criticism of DeJoy and the rollout of "Delivering for America."
The Democratic senator sparred with DeJoy in last month's Senate committee last month, and has requested an update from the postmaster general on the on-time delivery rates in metro Atlanta and north Georgia.
"The postmaster general has one job -- deliver the mail on time," Sen. Ossoff said in comments on Monday. "He is failing the people of Georgia, he owes me answers this week on his progress solving this problem. And as I said at the committee a few weeks ago: If he can't solve this problem, I don't think he deserves this job."
11Alive has been tracking on-time rates for First Class mail for weeks. Operations are slowly improving but the on-time rate for all First Class mail still remains below 70%. Meanwhile, only 44% of single-piece letters are being processed on time.
11Alive has also reached out to USPS to see whether they've responded to Ossoff's inquiry.
Full Louis DeJoy letter
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