Congresswoman Marie Newman votes to strengthen postal service

Leadership by U.S. Rep. Marie Newman would help strengthen postal service and ensure reliable, on-time mail service for Chicago’s Southwest Side

U.S. Representative Marie Newman Tuesday (Feb 8, 2022) voted to improve mail delivery across Chicago’s Southwest Side and suburbs with the Postal Service Reform Act of 2022.

By saving billions in funding, increasing performance transparency and creating new sources of revenue, this bipartisan legislation will strengthen the financial footing of USPS so that it can return to delivering reliable, on-time mail service to Southwest Side residents who rely on the Postal Service to receive hard-earned paychecks, lifesaving prescriptions, tax returns and more.

“Far too many constituents across the Chicago region are used to going days and sometimes weeks without mail. Our residents rely on postal mail to receive their medicine, bills, tax refunds, and essential documents but these delivery delays and customer service issues are causing them to lose faith in one of America’s most trusted and respected institutions – the United States Postal Service,” said Congresswoman Newman.

“With today’s passage of the Postal Service Reform Act, the House is taking bold, bipartisan action to strengthen the Post Office, support our postal workers and preserve reliable, nationwide mail service for generations to come.”

Congresswoman Marie Newman, 3rd District Illinois

Because of the extremely unusual requirement that the Post Office fund 75 years of retiree benefits in advance, this institution is on the path to insolvency, facing an urgent shortage of funding as its delivery obligations continue to grow.

The Postal Service currently provides mail to nearly 159 million delivery points and adds an additional one million every year. Yet even as postal workers service more locations, revenue has continued to fall due to lower mail volume. Having suffered fourteen consecutive years of net losses, the Postal Service is projected to run out of funds entirely by 2024, threatening to worsen delays and service reductions that are already hampering the ability of Southwest Side residents to receive their mail and deliveries on time.

The Postal Service Reform Act of 2022 enacts several overdue changes to address these financial challenges, improve mail delivery and support postal workers and retirees, including:

Welcoming all future postal retirees into Medicare, delivering quality health care to our committed public servants while saving the Postal Service $22.6 billion over the next decade.
Repealing a burdensome requirement forcing the Postal Service to prefund retirees’ health care 75 years in advance, saving $27 billion over the next decade.
Promoting reliable delivery and transparency through a public-facing, online dashboard featuring national and local level service performance data.
Codifying the Postal Service’s longtime tradition of delivering mail and packages six days per week.
Allowing the Postal Service to raise additional revenues by offering non-commercial property and services to state, local and tribal governments.

Last year, Congresswoman Newman joined six of her congressional colleagues in the Chicago region in a letter to United States Postal Service (USPS) Postmaster General Louis DeJoy urging him to immediately address the persistent mail delivery and customer service issues that continue to disrupt the entire Chicago Metropolitan area.

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Ray Hanania is an award-winning opinion columnist, author & former Chicago City Hall reporter (1977-1992). A veteran who served during the Vietnam War and the recipient of four SPJ Peter Lisagor Awards for column writing, Hanania writes weekly opinion columns on mainstream American & Chicagoland topics for the Southwest News-Herald, Des Plaines Valley News, the Regional News, The Reporter Newspapers, and Suburban Chicagoland.

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