‘There Is Nothing New Under the Sun' — Ecclesiastes 1:9

‘There Is Nothing New Under the Sun’ — Ecclesiastes 1:9
By Bob Levi
NAPS Director of Legislative and Political Affairs

The benefit of outlasting multiple postmasters general, U.S. presidential administrations, presidents of multiple postal organizations and members of Congress is having a reasonably comprehensive and historical perspective on postal politics and strategies.

In early March, Postmaster General David Steiner disclosed to multiple news media that the Postal Service hired Alvarez & Marsel, a management consulting firm experienced in corporate restructuring and “turnaround.” This exercise is reminiscent of when the agency, 16 years ago, retained three different management firms tasked with making recommendations to restructure and turn around the Postal Service.

In 2010, the Postal Service engaged McKinsey & Company, Boston Consulting Group and Accenture to assist in developing a 10-year plan for postal sustainability. Ironically, the Postal Service publicly shared the consultants’ conclusions in the National Transportation Safety Board’s auditorium — the venue where the NTSB conducts transportation disaster post-mortems.

While Boston Consulting Group’s volume declines were close to what happened, many of the recommendations offered by McKinsey and implemented did not pan out or were not adopted. In part, McKinsey suggested service cutbacks, slower mail delivery and replacing unionized labor with non-unionized labor.

Among the recommendations the Postal Service implemented were the closure of processing plants in 2013 and 2014 after putting in place an increase in delivery times. The savings derived from these proposals amounted to only 5% of the McKinsey projection, harmed postal performance and may have intensified volume declines.

In tandem with the consultant disclosure, the PMG announced the Postal Service is in danger of running out of cash within a year, absent meaningful congressional action. This news should not be surprising, considering the distressing 1st Quarter FY26 mail revenue and volume numbers released at the Feb. 5 Board of Governors meeting and I reported in my March column. Within the context of the consultant hiring and the agency’s fragile financial condition, Steiner volunteered that all options are on the table, including potential cuts to service and staffing.

My March column also detailed what the Postal Service is requesting in order to stabilize its financial condition: raise its decades-old credit limit, grant it greater price flexibility, provide it with the authority to invest its retirement trust fund securities in other than just low-yield government bonds, create a fair calculation of its pension liability for retired pre-1971 Postal Department employees and revise its workers’ compensation program to reflect private-sector practices.

For more than three decades, many postmasters general have used the threat of service and staffing cuts to help leverage Congress to act on postal legislation. However, unlike previous congresses, bipartisanship is in short supply, yet cross-party cooperation is essential to pass postal legislation.

Moreover, some members of Congress, cabinet-level White House officials and President Trump himself may want to condition any type of legislative postal relief — particularly, raising the Postal Service’s credit limit — on yielding to the White House on governance, ratemaking authority and labor rules. In Trump’s first term, we saw this attempt regarding then-Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin’s attempt to wrest governance away from the Postal Service in exchange for a $10 billion pandemic-related line-of-credit.

Concerning postal governance, NAPS Executive Vice President Chuck Mulidore indicated in his column in this issue that postal governance will be on the Senate’s 2026 agenda. In early March, Trump made three new nominations to the Postal Board of Governors; this is in addition to the January renomination of Anthony Lomangino. As we went to press, Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chair Rand Paul (R-KY) had not scheduled a confirmation hearing.

As I mentioned a few paragraphs ago, bipartisanship is vital to enact postal legislation. So, it was reassuring to see there are members of Congress who are serious about postal excellence and committed to bipartisanship on this matter. This is the linchpin of the Congressional Postal Service Caucus.

Many of the aforementioned issues were on the minds of postal stakeholders participating in a March 5 roundtable conducted by the caucus and chaired by Reps. Nikki Budzinski (D-IL) and Jack Bergman (R-MI). NAPS President Ivan D. Butts shared the views of postal supervisors, managers and postmasters with the bipartisan panel. You can read his statement on page 12.

Finally, on March 17, the PMG and Government Accountability Office official David Marroni testified before the House Oversight and Government Reform Subcommittee on Government Operations, chaired by Rep. Pete Sessions (R-TX). (As you may recall, Marroni’s January NAPS Chat appearance was summarized in the March issue of The Postal Supervisor.)

Steiner and Marroni provided sobering accounts of the Postal Service’s finances, with Steiner restating his press-reported projection that the agency will run out of money within the next 12 months. To deal with the imminent cash crisis, he urged Congress to raise the agency’s credit limit beyond its current $15 billion limit.

Such an adjustment, he argued, would buy the Postal Service time to implement changes to align resources with service and invest in postal infrastructure. The credit limit was last adjusted in 1992.

Steiner also reaffirmed his legislative asks to revise the CSRS calculation, increase postal trust fund investment flexibility and modify the USPS workers’ compensation program. He further observed that the agency is weighed down by statutory and regulatory “anchors” that include many elements of the universal service obligation.

The PMG argued that the Postal Regulatory Commission should permit the USPS to raise postage of First-Class Mail to 90-95 cents to help underwrite the cost of providing universal service. In addition, Steiner suggested Congress appropriate the funds necessary to meet its universal service obligation.

These obligations include six-day delivery, door mail service, uniform postage (even to remote areas) and the continuation of money-losing rural post offices. At the conclusion of the hearing, Sessions and Subcommittee Ranking Member Kweisi Mfume (D-MD) pledged to work together on a bipartisan basis to address the current postal crisis.

Indeed, NAPS was in Washington at an auspicious time, enabling our LTS delegates to provide Congress information vital to legislatively assist with postal sustainability. You can view the legislative material we shared with our elected representatives and senators on our LTS page of the NAPS website. I am confident you would conclude NAPS anticipated most all the issues now on the front burner.

Postal congressional oversight, potential legislation to address a postmaster general’s priorities, consultant-generated recommendations and White House immersion in postal discussions all are par for the course; there is nothing new under the sun. NAPS is prepared!