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post office
Even After Electric Vehicle Progress, Advocates Say DeJoy Should Still Be Fired
"Any increase in E.V. acquisition at USPS is in spite of DeJoy, not because of him."
Dec 26, 2022
Postmaster General Louis DeJoy's widely praised announcement last week that the Postal Service will buy tens of thousands of electric vehicles in the coming years to help replace its aging delivery fleet should not be enough to save the scandal-plagued USPS chief's job, advocates said, pointing to his refusal to support a more ambitious electrification plan and his ongoing efforts to slash jobs, consolidate mail facilities, and hike prices for consumers.
"The bottom line is that any increase in E.V. acquisition at USPS is in spite of DeJoy, not because of him," Vishal Narayanaswamy of the Revolving Door Project, toldThe New Republic's Kate Aronoff. "Electrification would be proceeding much faster if we had a board that could fire him."
DeJoy, a Trump and GOP megadonor, was selected to serve as postmaster general in May 2020, and even news last year that he was facing an FBI investigation for potentially unlawful campaign finance activity during his time as a private logistics executive wasn't enough to harm his job security.
The postmaster general is chosen by—and can only be removed by—the USPS Board of Governors, a body composed of nine officials nominated by the president.
In the face of massive pressure to force out DeJoy, Biden has nominated and the narrowly Democratic Senate has confirmed five board governors, giving the president's picks a majority on the postal board and enough votes to remove the postmaster general, who does not serve a fixed term.
While Biden's nominees have raised questions and concerns about DeJoy's 10-year plan to overhaul USPS operations, calling it "strategically ill-conceived" and "dangerous," they have yet to mount a serious push for his removal.
"Electrification would be proceeding much faster if we had a board that could fire him."
Narayanaswamy lamented that the White House, too, appears uninterested in ousting DeJoy. The Biden administration "does not seem to care about replacing DeJoy and has more or less dropped it as a priority," Narayanaswamy told Aronoff, who argued in a column last week that "the potential of the USPS to propel an energy transition will continue to go untapped" as long as DeJoy is at the helm.
Though the new electric vehicle plan is a significant improvement over DeJoy's earlier proposal—which called for the purchase of 90% gas-guzzling trucks—"the USPS only plans to electrify 40% of its fleet" in total, Aronoff noted.
"The newly announced purchases also only represent about 10% of the existing federal fleet of cars, SUVs, and trucks, which is the largest in the world," Aronoff continued. "That means the majority of the fleet will still run on gasoline for the foreseeable future. What's more, the internal combustion engine–powered versions of the USPS's 'Next Generation Delivery Vehicles,' or NGDVs, get just 8.6 miles per gallon."
"The potential for the USPS to act as an engine of decarbonization and set industry-wide standards for electrification is vast. But DeJoy—who's talked repeatedly about downsizing and privatizing the USPS and has lucrative ties to private logistics firms—is unlikely to see things that way," she added. "It's still possible for Biden to replace pro-DeJoy members of the USPS Board of Governors, paving the way for them to replace DeJoy himself."
Two Trump-nominated board members who have defended DeJoy—Donald Moak and William Zollars—are currently in holdover years after their terms expired earlier this month, but Biden has yet to announce any new board picks despite grassroots pressure.
In late October, the Save the Post Office Coalition—a network of more than 300 public interest groups—urged Biden to replace Moak and Zollars with retiring Rep. Brenda Lawrence (D-Mich.) and policy expert Sarah Anderson.
Before her election to Congress, Lawrence worked for the Postal Service for three decades. Anderson, director of the Global Economy Project at the Institute for Policy Studies, has written about and researched the USPS for years, and her grandfather was a Postal Service employee.
"Congresswoman Lawrence and Ms. Anderson are public servants who would bring needed perspectives and expertise to the USPS Board of Governors at a time when the nation is looking to the board to start asking the tough questions of Louis DeJoy," said Porter McConnell, co-founder of the Save the Post Office Coalition.
Don't Shut Post Offices--Reinvent Them
Feb 29, 2016
Naomi Klein delivered the following remarks in Ottawa on February 29 at the Leap Day launch of Delivering Community Power, a proposal to turn postal offices into green community hubs to power Canada's next economy. Leap Day is the official kickoff date for dozens of climate action and events already planned in Canada and worldwide, which will take place throughout February and beyond. Check out leapyear2016.org and #leapmanifesto on Twitter for more.
I'd like to begin by acknowledging that we're on the traditional territory of the Algonquin people.
I'm delighted to be here today with my colleagues from the Canadian Union of Postal Workers, Idle No More, ACORN, and the Canadian Labour Congress, brought together by our allies from Friends of Public Services.
2016 is a leap year; today, February 29th, is Leap Day. We all enjoy the extra day we add to our calendars every four years to align them with the earth's orbit around the sun.
We do this because it's easier to change our human-created systems than to change the laws of nature. In this way, the leap year is a perfect metaphor for the present moment, in which our political and economic systems badly need updating to accommodate the hard realities of our common home, the Earth.
We see the conflicts all around us. In the gap between what scientists tell us we must do to prevent catastrophic warming, and the emission reduction pledges our government has proposed. In the gap between even those inadequate pledges and the actual policies that would get us there.
We see more gaps between the promise of reconciliation with First Nations in Canada and the gross inequities facing Indigenous communities. We see more gaps still, between the values of inclusion and compassion with which so many Canadians identify--and the economic policies that continue to exile many to the margin.
The gaps are huge and they are many. Too many, in fact, to tackle slowly and one at a time. In a time of overlapping crises, we need visionary policies capable of addressing multiple failures at the same time. So, how do we make the leap?
The Proposal
We're here to launch a concrete proposal for what a post-carbon economy could look like in Canada, one that would touch every community in the country. "Delivering Community Power" lays out a vision for post offices with solar panels on the roof, electric chargers outside, and a low-emissions fleet on the roads.
But this is far from cosmetic. Services provided inside would expand to include food delivery, door-knocking on elders' homes, and perhaps most exciting, affordable banking.With this proposal, the post office once again becomes a community space, where you can come in to mail a letter or make a deposit; organize farm-to-table food delivery for your home; get advice and a loan for rooftop solar panels; invest in a community energy project; and buy products from local businesses.
We believe this is no time to further contract public services. But neither is it a moment to simply protect a static status quo.Rather, our moment calls on us to reimagine what is possible.
And we find ourselves at a critical juncture that makes this kind of visionary change both necessary and entirely possible. The Trudeau government is in the process of unleashing billions of dollars of stimulus to Canada's economy, which is suffering thanks to our ill-advised ride on the oil roller coaster.
What we are saying is that every new public dollar we spend has to do more than simply spur random economic activity. Given the pressing nature of the climate crisis, as well as the many social justice fronts on which this government has pledged to act, that money must fuel the transformation of our economy. Of our energy system. Of our public sphere so that it meets all of today's complex needs.
Canada needs more than stimulus money. We need catalyst money--investments thoughtfully designed so that they bring down emissions, while making Canada a fairer and better place to live, particularly for the most vulnerable.
Which is where today's launch comes in. Progressives often get asked: we know what you're against, what are you for? Well, this is it, or a big piece of it. We encourage everyone to take a look.
Six months ago we launched The Leap Manifesto, a bold proposal for how we can transition Canada off fossil fuels in a way that battles systemic inequalities. We called for a transition grounded in "caring for the planet and one another"--and this proposal from Canada's postal workers turns that principle into a concrete vision for how to boldly retrofit one of our most ubiquitous and beloved brick-and-mortar institutions.
Since we launched The Leap, more than 30,000 people and close to 200 organizations have endorsed the document, and today dozens of groups are hosting teach-ins, sit-ins, rallies, community events and solar installations to celebrate the Leap Year. And not just in Canada: from Zagreb to Copenhagen to the Bronx.
We all have the same message for decision-makers: small steps are not enough; it's time for a leap. So let's get to work. Thank you.
Post Office to the First Amendment: Drop Dead
Apr 17, 2007
Everyone who visits the Common Dreams site is reads many articles that were first published or commissioned by print publications. Without these print publications, there would be a lot less material for all of us to read, and some of our most important reporters and thinkers wouldn't get paid to write.
Yet the independent magazines and small publications that contribute to Common Dreams are under attack by government bureaucrats and media conglomerates. Unless we take action now, the wide variety of voices and viewpoints available on sites like this one will become considerably diminished.
This crisis which could have devastating effect on new media revolves around Americas very first and arguably most visionary and progressive media policy: postal rates for periodicals.
Because the Post Office is a monopoly, and because magazines must use it, the postal rates always have been skewed to make it cheaper for smaller publications to get launched and to survive. The whole idea has been to use the postal rates to keep publishing as competitive and wide open as possible. This bedrock principle was put in place by James Madison and Thomas Jefferson. They considered it mandatory to create the press system, the Fourth Estate necessary for self-government.
It was postal policy that converted the free press clause in the First Amendment from an abstract principle into a living breathing reality for Americans. And it has served that role throughout our history.
What the Post Office is now proposing goes directly against 215 years of postal policy. The Post Office is in the process of implementing a radical reformulation of its mailing rates for magazines. Under the plan, smaller periodicals will be hit with a much larger increase than the big magazines, as much as 30 percent. Some of the largest circulation magazines will face hikes of less than 10 percent.
The new rates, which go into effect on July 15, were developed with no public involvement or congressional oversight, and the increased costs could damage hundreds, even thousands, of smaller publications, possibly putting many out of business. This includes nearly every political journal in the nation. These are the magazines that often provide the most original journalism and analysis. These are the magazines that provide much of the content on Common Dreams. We desperately need them.
What the Post Office is planning to do now, in the dark of night, is implement a rate structure that gives the best prices to the biggest publishers, hence letting them lock in their market position and lessen the threat of any new competition. The new rates could make it almost impossible to launch a new magazine, unless it is spawned by a huge conglomerate.
Not surprisingly, the new scheme was drafted by Time Warner, the largest magazine publisher in the nation. All evidence available suggests the bureaucrats responsible have never considered the implications of their draconian reforms for small and independent publishers, or for citizens who depend upon a free press.
The corruption and sleaziness of this process is difficult to exaggerate. As one lawyer who works for a large magazine publisher admits, "It takes a publishing company several hundred thousand dollars to even participate in these rate cases. Some large corporations spend millions to influence these rates." Little guys, and the general public who depend upon these magazines, are not at the table when the deal is being made.
The genius of the postal rate structure over the past 215 years was that it did not favor a particular viewpoint; it simply made it easier for smaller magazines to be launched and to survive. That is why the publications opposing the secretive Post Office rate hikes cross the political spectrum. This is not a left-wing issue or a right-wing issue, it is a democracy issue. And it is about having competitive media markets that benefit all Americans. This reform will have disastrous effects for allsmall and mid-sized publications, be they on politics, music, sports or gardening.
This process was conducted with such little publicity and pitched only at the dominant players that we only learned about it a few weeks ago and it is very late in the game. But there is something you can do. Please go to www.stoppostalratehikes.com and sign the letter to the Postal Board protesting the new rate system and demanding a congressional hearing before any radical changes are made. The deadline for comments is April 23, 2007.
I know many of you are connected to publications that go through the mail, or libraries and bookstores that pay for subscriptions to magazines and periodicals. If you fall in these categories, it is imperative you get everyone connected to your magazine or operation to go to www.stoppostalratehikes.com.
We do not have a moment to lose. If everyone who reads this piece responds at www.stoppostalratehikes.com, and then sends a link to it to their friends urging them to do the same, we can win. If there is one thing we have learned at Free Press over the past few years, it is that if enough people raise hell, we can force politicians to do the right thing. This is a time for serious hell-raising.
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