By Harry Glenn
The 113th Congress closed with a flurry of activity last month and members of your AUSPL board and staff were on the ground in our nation’s Capital to monitor legislative activity and meet the key players on postal reform legislation in the upcoming 114th Congress.
President of the Board Morgan Wolaver, Vice President Gary Phillips, and Director of Operations Mark Karolczyk were pleased to learn while they were there that the final omnibus appropriations bill to keep the federal government open and running through September 30, 2015 included a legislative provision stating, “That none of the funds provided in this Act shall be used to consolidate or close small rural and other small post offices.” The legislation also included a provision requiring the postal service to maintain six-day mail delivery throughout the same time period.
Congress adjourned for the year without any final resolution on postal reform legislation and the way forward on this legislation in the new Congress remained unclear. What is known is that there will be an entirely new slate of Congressional leadership to oversee the US Postal Service. This includes a new Chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), and his designee to chair the newly named Subcommittee on Government Operations, Mark Meadows (R-North Carolina), the subcommittee with jurisdiction over the postal service. With Republican control of the Senate switching to the Republicans, Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson will assume the Chairmanship of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, which has Senate jurisdiction over postal matters.
During their visit to Washington, your AUSPL team had the opportunity to meet with senior staff members of Senator Johnson to share with them the association’s priorities for postal reform legislation. Although Senator Johnson has not yet released his committee’s list of legislative priorities, his staff appreciated the visit and said they will use AUSPL as a resource on postal matters.
The AUSPL team also visited with Wyoming Senator Mike Enzi, the incoming Chairman of the Budget Committee, and North Dakota Senator Heidi Heitkamp, to discuss access to postal facilities for thousands of their rural constituents. They also paid visits to the staff of other key Senators in the postal debate including Delaware Senator Tom Carper, Arizona Senator Jeff Flake, and Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren.
The team opened their Washington trip by visiting with newly elected Congressman David Jolly (R-Florida), a long-time friend of AUSPL and a champion on our issues. They also met with Congressman Mark Amodei (R-Nevada), an active member of the House Appropriations Committee and the representative of Reno, Nevada, the host city for our annual conference this May. They extended an invitation to Congressman Amodei to attend and speak at the conference. He was excited about the opportunity as he recalled his youth when his grandmother served as a Nevada Postmaster.
Finally, your AUSPL team also met with staff to two important members of the House Oversight Subcommittee on the Postal Service – Congressman Blake Farenthold (R-Texas) and Congressman Doug Collins (R-Georgia). Both members have been key players in the development of postal reform legislation and their staff indicated that they will continue to be involved when the new Congress convenes.
During the Washington trip, the team discussed the agenda for the Washington fly-in for our membership which is scheduled for March 17-19. This is an important opportunity for members who are able to attend to schedule time to visit with their Congressmen and Senators to educate them about AUSPL, our mission to reach postal customers in the most cost-effective way particularly in rural areas, and our keen interest in postal reform and reorganization issues. The more members who travel to Washington for the fly-in, the more offices we can reach. This is particularly important in 2015 given the large number of new members of the House and Senate and the total change in leadership of the committees with jurisdiction over the postal service.