Time To Break Up The United States Postal Service and Privatize US mail and Parcel Delivery

Why is the United States Postal Service operating in the red forever? Because there is no employee training.

Supervisors do not respond to the issues and problems presented to them from the community. Supervisors are totally out of touch with the community and do not care that they are out of touch with the community.

Tuesday of this week while gazing out the window, I noticed the mail carrier driving up and down Muirwood Drive. I could see that it was not the regular mail carrier that delivers mail on Muirwood Drive. The phone rang. I answered what became a long conversation. I continued to gaze out the window as I talked and noticed the mail carrier go by my home again and again. I started to jot down little slashes for each time the mail carrier drove past my home and did not deliver mail.

I had jotted down eight slashes before 3:30 p.m. I needed to run an errand and left my home and decided to see if I could spot the mail carrier as I drove along Muirwood Drive. I saw the mail carrier over near West Los Positas Boulevard and Muirwood Drive. I finished my errand and returned at 4:30 p.m.. The mail carrier was still located over near West Los Positas Boulevard and Muirwood Drive. The mail carrier has been in the neighborhood three-plus hours and still did not have the mail delivered.

The regular mail carrier delivers mail as he moves along Muirwood Drive and generally gets through the neighborhood in an hour or so. So I am thinking with the cost of gas in today's economy and the mail carrier on the route today driving up and down the street repeatedly and not delivering mail must be expensive.

Obviously there has been no training provided to this mail carrier on the route today. She is lost and does not have the route set up to the flow of the established protocol. She is driving to each address getting out delivering the mail than getting back into the vehicle driving to the next address and is not securing the vehicle while she is away from it delivering the mail to each address and missing the addresses in my block.

I called the Postal Office on Black Avenue at 6:00 p.m. There was no answer. I left a message with the supervisor regarding the mail carrier driving up and down the Muirwood Drive South neighborhood repeatedly and not delivering the mail. That, as of 6 p.m., still has not delivered mail to residences on Muirwood Drive South between Eastwood Court and Lemonwood, roughly a dozen homes. I called the Postal Office on Black Avenue again the following morning Wednesday of this week and left a second message with the same supervisor. The mail never was delivered in the neighborhood last evening and as of noon the next day. The supervisor never responded to my messages. In the ten plus years I have been here, there has never been a regular day of mail delivery that I did not have mail delivered until Tuesday of this week.

The ineptness of the USPS as evidenced with the Pleasanton Postal Service has put the U.S. Postal Service in dire financial straits. According to a Reuters story, United States Postmaster Patrick Donahoe said on Tuesday may 17, 2011, "that without Congressional action, the service would default on its payments."

"As things stand, we do not have the cash to make a $5.5 billion prepayment for future retiree health benefits due September 30, 2011," Donahoe said.

According to the story, the USPS lost $7.8 Billion in 2010. By 2020 the deficit is expected to be $150 Billion. There is no resolution to be had. Lawmakers, postal regulators and unions cannot agree to setting delivery schedules, price increases and labor costs.

Some members of the GOP in Congress are upset with the Medicare and Social Security costs. The USPS is a much larger hangover than Medicare and Social Security. What is different is the unions are so entrenched primarily as the result of the Democrats in Congress. The United States Postal Service is a huge growing weight around the necks of United States tax payers.

I believe the USPS should be privatized, broken up and offered to FedEx and UPS, two premier delivery services that year in and year out operate consistently, efficiently turning in profit year after year.