Christmas came early at my PO. On Monday the station manager called many carriers to the office for their annual Christmas presents - Letters of Warnings! Now I don't know personally if all of the LOWs were warranted or unwarranted, however the carrier next to me got a LOW for going past his approved overtime. Why did he go past? Because he was approved for three hours total overtime - two on his route and one on another. However, the last "hour" was delivered in the dark, which of course took longer than an hour. So instead of getting a "thank you" note for delivering in the dark, he instead was punished!

While shopping tonight I saw one of my old carrier friends who went to work at another station in Dallas. I told him who my station manager was and he said he had someone even worse, a person that I remembered once poured hot coffee on a clerk union steward in a confrontation. I know of several abusive people in Dallas who are now station managers. It's sad. Most of these people have no business supervising other people. Another sad thing is that the people who would make good managers would never do it now because they don't want to be associated with these people. As for these managers' attempts at supervising by treating people like sh*t, it doesn't get them very far. I know one of these managers is called "the devil" behind her back by most of the employees. These employees would rather eat dirt than cooperate with the devil. And yet she wonders why it's like pulling teeth to get these carriers and clerks to work with her.

The following is a message from NALC President Young:

*********
 
In last year's postal reform bill, we secured our collective 
bargaining rights. The ability to form a union and to negotiate 
collectively ensures workplace fairness and a decent standard of 
living. Every American worker should have that ability. It is 
especially important to letter carriers that workers from 
competing delivery companies have that ability - if they work 
for low wages and receive few benefits, our position at the 
bargaining table is damaged. 
 
Unfortunately, tens of thousands of Federal Express workers are 
effectively denied the right to organize a union because of a 
loophole in the law that permits FedEx to classify its delivery 
workers as "airline employees," even though they never go close 
to an airport. As such, they are covered by the Railway Labor 
Act (RLA), which makes organizing a union almost impossible - 
you have to win a national ballot instead of building a union 
location by location, as permitted by the National Labor 
Relations Act (NRLA). Workers at the Postal Service, UPS and 
other delivery companies are covered by the NRLA. 
 
But we can do something about this injustice today. Sen. Tom 
Harkin, who has led the battle against contracting out our jobs, 
has introduced an amendment to the pending Labor-HHS 
appropriation bill to require that all express delivery workers 
who do not work at or near airports be covered by the NLRA, not 
the RLA. This weekend the Senate is working on that 
appropriations bill. 
 
I write to urge you to take a few minutes this weekend to 
contact Senator Bill Nelson to ask him to support the Harkin 
Amendment. Call Sen. Nelson at 202.224-5274 
(www.billnelson.senate.gov). Tell him that NALC supports the 
Harkin Amendment to the Labor-HHS appropriations bill and that 
letter carriers in Florida want fairness for FedEx workers and a 
level playing field for the Postal Service. If you can't get 
through this weekend, call as early as possible on Monday, 
December 10. A vote is expected early next week. 
 
As I said at our recent National Training Conference, our 
standard of living will be threatened if we do not help rebuild 
the Middle Class in America. Strengthening the labor movement is 
the most important thing we can do to advance that cause. I hope 
I can count on you to do your part by calling Senator Nelson in 
support of the Harkin Amendment as soon as possible. 
 
In Solidarity, 
William H. Young 
President 
 
-------------------------------------------------- 
 
Visit the web address below to tell your friends about this. 
 
http://www.unionvoice.org/join-forward.html?domain=nalc&r=U1NKaIs1sxSt 

If your mailbox blows up, check YouTube. Chances are the little punks filmed it.

 

 

Not sure, but I think this is a pic of the USPS float at Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mathewajay/2055864574/

I didn't watch the parade, but the first thing I heard from several people when they came over for Thanksgiving is that they saw the postal float and "no wonder stamps are so high." It's sad for the USPS that the Postal Service puts effort into the float, only to have people equate it to higher stamp prices. 

Tom
PostalProfiles.com