If the US Postal Service would abide by its own rule, each homeowner could easily stop junk mail from getting into their mailbox by putting a written notice on their mailbox expressing their preference.

The US Postal Services practices are supposed to be according to the Domestic Mail Manual (DMM). The DMM contains provision 508.1.1.2 that says, “Refusal at Delivery: The addressee may refuse to accept a mailpiece when it is offered for delivery.” I interpret this rule to mean that if a homeowner wants to refuse an unwanted mailpiece (i.e. junk mail), the homeowner can do so when the mailpiece is offered for delivery. More to the point – refuse it before it is put into the mailbox!

In practical application, since the postal carrier comes to homes at different times each day, the homeowner cannot be waiting at the mailbox to dialogue with the mail carrier about each mailpiece. The only realistic way to interpret 508.1.1.2 therefore is that the homeowner should post a notice on the mailbox telling the postal carrier about the homeowner’s preference. The notice to the postal service must be specific and unambiguous. For instance, a homeowner should certainly be able to write, “No mail that is not addressed to the Jones” because that does not require the postal carrier to make a subjective judgment. On the other hand, it would not be acceptable to write “no junk mail” because the definition of “junk mail” is subjective and the mail carrier cannot decide.

Unfortunately, the US Postal Service has written to me that they will NOT honor a notice refusing mail, not matter how specifically it is worded, because the postal carrier does not have time to sort through the mail at my mailbox to pick out the pieces that are not addressed to me. Therefore, the US Postal Service is passing their sorting and disposing task onto me by putting all the mail they want into my mailbox, even though this seemingly violates 508.1.1.2.

Since the U.S. Postal Service will not abide by 508.1.1.2, homeowners need to stop unwanted mail at the source (i.e. by blocking the sender from sending it). We need a nationwide “Do Not Mail” law to create a one-stop, convenient place for homeowners to give senders notice that we do not want certain kinds of mail sent to our homes.

http://www.newdream.org/emails/ta19.html

Signed,

Ramsey A Fahel

“Once the conclusion has been reached that the Postal Service should remain a public institution, an urgent need arises to modernize and clarify the mechanism that finances its operations—the postal monopoly.

A great deal of confusion exists today, even at the Postal Service, about the true extent of its scope. This confusion is understandable considering much of the nation’s postal monopoly law dates back to 17th century England and is virtually untranslatable in the modern environment.” (p.X)

“The Postal Service employs approximately 843,000 people, making it the second largest workforce in the U.S. Its jobs are highly coveted. As of July 2001, the Postal Service had a backlog of some 400,000 job applicants and virtually no turnover. Contributing to the Postal Service’s ability to recruit and retain employees is the special status within the Federal government of postal workers, who enjoy the right to collectively bargain. The Postal Service is also required by statute to compensate employees at a level comparable to the private sector. In addition, postal employees have among the most attractive benefits packages in the nation.” (p.XV)

Critical to this effort, however, is the ability of management and labor to work constructively together to determine the right size of the postal workforce and to ensure appropriate flexibilities in its deployment. Both are significant issues. More than $3 out of every $4 in Postal Service revenues go to cover the costs of current and retired postal employees. Of the approximately $92 billion in debt and unfunded obligations the Postal Service is struggling with today, more than $48 billion is due to the costs of retiree health benefits alone. Far more Far more than individual benefits, the size of the workforce determines the costs of the workforce. Therefore, getting the right size workforce is the critical issue when it comes to controlling the costs of the workforce and upholding the Postal Service’s ability to compensate its employees in a manner competitive with the private sector. Fortunately, there is a significant attrition opportunity, with some 47% of current career employees eligible for regular retirement by 2010 that can help guide the rightsizing of the workforce in the least disruptive manner possible.” (p. XV)

Gradual Displacement of Mail Volume (billions)
2002 2007 2012 2017
First Class 102.4 98.7 90.5 81.0
Priority 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3
Periodicals 9.7 9.5 9.1 8.7
Standard Mail 87.2 97.1 98.2 88.1
Package Service 1.1 1.1 1.1 1.2
International 0.9 0.9 0.9 0.9
Other government 0.5 0.5 0.5 0.5
Total 202.8 208.9 201.5 181.7 (p.5)

The Mailbox Monopoly: Current Law
“Whoever knowingly and willfully deposits any mailable matter such as statements of accounts, circulars, sale bills, or other like matter, on which no postage has been paid, in any letter box established, approved, or accepted by the Postal Service for the receipt or delivery of mail matter on any mail route with intent to avoid payment of lawful postage thereon, shall for each such offense be fined under this title” (18 U.S.C. § 1725). (p.25)

While the Postal Service should become more businesslike, it remains a government entity. Private carriers have no U.S. Treasury to borrow from at favorable rates, no monopoly markets to reliably generate more than 75% of operating revenues and no government exemption from most taxes and laws imposed on private enterprises. Given that distinction and the Postal Service’s presence in contested markets, it has a special duty to ensure it does not wield its monopoly and government privileges unfairly against companies that have no such advantages. (p.67)

The challenge today, however, is far more complex. Postal workers enjoy special status within the Federal workforce. They are granted the right to negotiate wages, hours, and workplace conditions through collective bargaining. The 1970 Act was debated and enacted against the dramatic backdrop of the first major strike of Federal workers in U.S. history, involving approximately 152,000 postal employees in 671 locations. The strike was particularly paralyzing to business in New York City, the country’s financial center. The strike was over shortly after it began, and in 1971, the U.S. government signed the first comprehensive Federal labor contract ever achieved through collective bargaining. The ongoing right to collective bargaining (absent the option to strike) was a key outcome, in addition to language in the 1970 Act requiring the Postal Service to offer compensation to employees that is comparable to the private sector. (p.108)

The Postal Service Pays More than 76% of its Revenues to Employees
The Postal Service employs approximately 843,000 people in both career and noncareer positions (Exhibit 6-1), making its workforce more than twice the size of the United Parcel Service and more than four times the size of FedEx. All tallied, the Postal Service’s workforce as of 2002 was second in size only to Wal-Mart in the United States and was the fourth largest civilian workforce in the world (Exhibit 6-2). Approximately, one out of every three civilian employees of the U.S. government works for the Postal Service.3 Given these facts, it comes as little surprise that more than $3 out of every $4 earned by the institution in Fiscal Year 2002—some $51.5 billion of $66.5 billion—went to pay the wages and benefits of its employees.4 Unlike their private-sector counterparts, however, total compensation costs are largely outside management’s control. Benefits are effectively set by statute. Costs for retiree health care and pension plans are skyrocketing for all employers, and the Postal Service has unfunded obligations for retiree health benefits of approximately $48 billion.5 Yet retiree health care and pension benefits are effectively “off the table” of collective bargaining. (p.110)

In sum, these benefits accounted for just under $20 billion of the $51.5 billion the
Postal Service spent on its employees in Fiscal Year 2002—almost $1 out of every $3 the Postal Service spent in that fiscal year.13 A lack of negotiating authority with respect to these costs would be intolerable to most private-sector companies. They should be brought within the collective bargaining process at the business-oriented Postal Service, as well. (p.118)

Nearly half a million Americans today are retired postal workers. As a result, pension and retiree health benefits alone comprise $6 billion of the annual $12 billion the
Postal Service pays out in fringe benefits.16 As pension and health care costs skyrocket for all employers, the Postal Service is not alone in its need to manage this large liability effectively. Postal Service employees, too, have a stake in this effort. Particularly given the fact that more than 45% of the Postal Service’s career workforce is within a decade of the minimum retirement age (Exhibit 6-3), involving these benefits in the collective bargaining process will ensure that the health care needs of future postal retirees are adequately addressed as the Postal Service works to control and manage this large category of expense. (p.123)

The proposed statewide “Do not mail” is an Opt-Out law. Only those not desiring advertising mail need opt-out. Anyone desiring advertising mail can do nothing – and continue to receive it. Why deny those wishing to avoid advertising mail the power to do so?

I do not consider handling unwanted advertising placed against my will on my personal property to be a civic obligation!

The US Supreme Court said in the Rowan case in 1970, ““In today’s [1970] complex society we are inescapably captive audiences for many purposes, but a sufficient measure of individual autonomy must survive to permit every householder to exercise control over unwanted mail. To make the householder the exclusive and final judge of what will cross his threshold undoubtedly has the effect of impeding the flow of ideas, information, and arguments that, ideally, he should receive and consider. Today’s merchandising methods, the plethora of mass mailings subsidized by low postal rates, and the growth of the sale of large mailing lists as an industry in itself have changed the mailman from a carrier of primarily private communications, as he was in a more leisurely day, and have made him an adjunct of the mass mailer who sends unsolicited and often unwanted mail into every home. It places no strain on the doctrine of judicial notice to observe that whether measured by pieces or pounds, Everyman’s mail today is made up overwhelmingly of material he did not seek from persons he does not know. And all too often it is matter he finds offensive.”

Furthermore, the Supreme Court said, “the mailer’s right to communicate is circumscribed only by an affirmative act of the addressee giving notice that he wishes no further mailings from that mailer.

To hold less would tend to license a form of trespass and would make hardly more sense than to say that a radio or television viewer may not twist the dial to cut off an offensive or boring communication and thus bar its entering his home. Nothing in the Constitution compels us to listen to or view any unwanted communication, whatever its merit; we see no basis for according the printed word or pictures a different or more preferred status because they are sent by mail.”

We need a nationwide “Do Not Mail” law to create a one-stop, convenient place for homeowners to give senders the aforementioned affirmative notice that we do not want certain kinds of mail sent to our homes. http://www.nomorejunkmail.org

Signed,
Ramsey A Fahel
Arvada, CO

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