By Noah Zucker

Delaware’s two U.S. senators have thrown their weight behind a push to have the U.S. Postal Service’s Postmaster General Louis DeJoy restore on-time mail delivery.

Sens. Tom Carper and Chris Coons were two of 33 Democratic lawmakers who signed a recent letter to Mr. DeJoy.

“It is your duty, first and foremost, to protect service and ensure timely mail delivery for every person in this nation,” the two said in a press release. “We demand that you not make additional changes that will harm service for the American people.”

This comes amid reports that the postmaster general will put in place cost-cutting measures that will lead to higher prices and less frequent delivery.

The senators also urged Mr. DeJoy “to be fully transparent with the public about Postal Service operations and the reasons they are still facing delays.”

Sens. Coons and Carper included a long list of consequences their constituents have dealt with as a result of the postal delays, such as late paychecks and payments, delays in the delivery of critical prescriptions and lost customers for small businesses.

“Reportedly, mail delivery has not yet recovered after the peak (holiday) season, with constituents continuing to experience delays despite the tireless efforts of postal workers,” they said.

But the U.S. Postal Service disputes this.

USPS responds

“We have returned to pre-peak operational conditions in most areas and we fully anticipate continued improvements in service performance,” said an email from Melissa Lomax, a strategic communications specialist for the Postal Service’s South Jersey and Philadelphia districts, which includes Delaware.

She added, “Throughout the peak season, the Postal Service, along with the broader shipping sector, faced pressure on service performance across categories as it managed through a record of volume while also overcoming employee shortages due to the ongoing surge in COVID-19 cases (and) winter storms in the Northeast, as well as ongoing capacity challenges with airlifts and trucking for moving historic volumes of mail.”

In total, Ms. Lomax said the Postal Service delivered 1.1 billion packages this holiday season.

She said the postmaster general and the executive leadership team took a number of actions to address the problems, including working with union leadership to retain peak-season employees until operations have stabilized and adding 10,000 full-time positions.

The team also extended lease agreements on rented satellite facilities being used to process and dispatch packages, reworked its organizational reporting structures and made liberal use of overtime as necessary.

Challenging time for carriers

John Embleton delivers the mail on his route in Seaford, but he’s also the president of the Delaware Rural Letter Carriers’ Association, a union. He had some insight into where exactly the problems in the system lie.

“The mail is moving when it gets to the local offices. The carriers are working very hard to get it done,” he said. “When we get it, it’s gone.”

He says the problem lies at the larger centralized distribution centers, like the one in Wilmington.

“Logistically, with the effects of COVID and so many people being sick and the increased volume” Mr. Embleton said those places have just not been able to function properly.

He said that in addition to the personnel challenges the pandemic has presented, volume has increased exponentially. Even in the aftermath of the holiday season, Mr. Embleton said USPS is dealing with four to five times the number of letters and packages it handled in prior years.

“This is my twenty-seventh year (and) I’ve never seen anything quite like it,” he said.

Back in the peak season, Mr. Embleton said the situation would often become even worse if FedEx and UPS decided they couldn’t handle additional deliveries from their customers. This happened on Black Friday, for example. All those packages got dumped onto the already deeply strained USPS.

Customer reviews

Jo Schmeiser, the executive director of the Greater Milford Chamber of Commerce, said in an email that the service she receives has improved drastically since the holiday season.

“They are doing a good job now,” she said of the Milford post office’s delivery.

“We are now receiving items in a timely manner,” she said. “Since our last conversation (in December) we’ve had mail arrive within a few days of the postmarked date, and even despite the winter weather issues we’ve had, we’ve had delivery daily.”

This is a big shift from late December, when Susie Avalos, the chamber’s administrative assistant, said the organization was receiving its mail as infrequently as once a week. She also reported that the chamber brought its outgoing mail to the post office in Frederica because delivery from the one in Milford was so slow.

“Out of convenience we are still sending our mail from a neighboring post office,” Ms. Schmeiser said.

She has not heard any complaints about the postal situation from the chamber’s members in a while.

“Thankfully we haven’t heard anything lately from businesses or individuals, so we’re hoping no news is good news,” Ms. Schmeiser said.

But Harrington’s Jim Moore had a less than glowing review of his post office’s recent performance.

“Before the pandemic, they would always do great. I would always get my mail between 10:30 a.m. and 11 every day,” he said. “Now it’s like a roulette wheel. You don’t know where it’s going to land.”

He said letter carriers often mix up mail in his neighborhood, so he and his neighbors “have to go out and hand it off to each other.”

But Mr. Moore’s problems with USPS aren’t localized to Harrington.

“I ordered a DVD on eBay,” he said. “It went from New York to California to Delaware. They don’t know why it did that.”

That wasn’t the only example he provided. He also ordered a movie poster from China, which arrived in Wilmington after nine days. Then it sat in Wilmington for another nine days until Mr. Moore opened an investigation into the package with USPS. Then, he said the poster “magically” showed up on his doorstep.

He’s also had trouble mailing checks to Wilmington. One, for an eye doctor, was sent on Jan. 23 and didn’t arrive until Feb. 15. Mr. Moore also prefers to make his credit card and mortgage payments by mail, but has decided to start making payments online after two payments he sent arrived at their destination two weeks late.

“I think it’s two-fold,” Mr. Moore said when asked what he thought the cause was. “I know nobody’s going to the mall or the store, so they’re ordering more stuff, but (USPS) didn’t compensate by hiring more people because I know the post office’s budget is in crisis.”

Now, he said “the same amount of people may be doing double or triple their normal work.”

Mr. Moore has no grievances with individual postal workers.

“They are very polite,” he said. “When I go in and tell them about my tracking issue, it seems like they have the same information I have. I was thinking they had a magic code or something they could put in, (but) they’re kind of oblivious.”

Possible solutions

Mr. Moore of Harrington believes USPS simply needs more manpower.

“I think they just need more people,” he said. “I think they just need to throw more bodies at the pandemic.”

Mr. Moore said he supports his senators’ efforts to block changes to the agency, for now at least.

“At least until the pandemic is over,” he said. “Maybe a year from now when we’ve all been vaccinated and we’re back to what normal was, but there’s too many people who aren’t going out during this. You can’t cut back anymore.”

Mr. Embleton did not want to go into politics when interviewed on Thursday night. He was still working through a 12-plus hour shift including hours out in the rain and snow.

He said it’s important to his union to continue to have a good relationship with Mr. DeJoy. At the same time, he said he’s always had a good working relationship with his two senators as well and that he appreciates their passion for the Postal Service.

He did have some ideas when asked about possible reforms that would help the agency.

“We’re hoping that Congress can pass meaningful postal reform (by) eliminating the pre-funding mandate, which has burdened the postal service with pre-funding future health benefits for 75 years,” he said. “That there would be a good first step in providing meaningful reform for the Postal Service.”

That shift, Mr. Embleton said, would allow USPS to update it’s outdated fleet of trucks and logistical equipment at the distribution centers.

“Politics aside, I’m hoping they’ll work together for meaningful postal reform,” he said of Congress.