Few people at a public hearing concerning Muncie postal service plants seemed to agree with those presenting its possible demise.
After showing a short video describing just how dire the situation for USPS has become, district manager Lynn Smith took the stage.
"The postal service is responding to a changing marketplace," he said. "And we're in need of a radical realignment."
That realignment, which the USPS said would save more than $3.5 million per year for the Muncie plant alone, would come at the price of 41 jobs in the same plant, and all sorting would be completed in Indianapolis, plant manager Bernice Grant said.
USPS is proposing consolidation for several of its plants across the country, and about 35,000 jobs would be lost on the national level.
The new system would also increase the amount of days per first-class item. Currently a mandated overnight process, the changes would push that time to two or three days per item.
Increasing the number of days would allow the plants to work 20 hours a day, as opposed to the current level of about six, and Grant said this change will make the system more efficient.
"It would allow for fuller trucks and fewer stops," she said. "All while doing nothing to impact pickup and delivery."
Ball State Mailing Services Manager Jerry Ault, among many others, disagreed.
"If they can't get overnight service, people will go to private carriers," Ault said. "They won't go to [USPS] Express service. It's cheaper elsewhere."
The plan would be detrimental in its current state, Ault said.
"If you go ahead with this, it would cost Mailing Services $8,000 to $10,000 a year," he said to the managers.
But Smith said the postal service doesn't have much of a choice.
"We're no longer receiving the volume of mail we used to," he said. "A decline in volume means we have less revenue. Simply put, we need fewer facilities."
The plan, which is currently in the investigative phase, would eliminate up to 300 facilities around the nation.
"We have been using the same process for decades," Smith said.
The overnight process currently in use requires almost all mail to be in the sorting facilities before it is able to be sorted, he said.
The new system would allow mail to be sorted throughout the day.
State representative and Muncie mayor-elect Dennis Tyler debated the cost of elimination during the forum.
"When I went to talk to the direct mail workers in Indianapolis, they said the new system would take from five to seven days," Tyler said.
He said he visited the plant to which the current facilities would move.
"I walked in and I saw mail stacked to the ceiling," he said. "What happens when they take on all of Central Indiana's mail?"
Grant was quick to question Tyler's argument.
"Anyone's first time in a sorting facility can be overwhelming," she said. "I work in that plant every day and I've never seen mail stacked to the ceiling."
Retired postal worker James Cary offered a solution that countered the elimination of plants.
"Managers should be proactive and positive," he said. "They should be going from business to business selling the service."
The power, he said, ultimately lies in the hands of Americans.
"The real owners are those who are in this room, and especially those who aren't. We need to tell the postal service we're not happy."
USPS will continue taking public comments until the study ends on Dec. 14.
Comments can be mailed to:
Manager, Consumer & Industry Contact
Greater Indiana District
PO Box 9661
Indianapolis, IN 46298-9661
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