I was asked to speak. I have quoted my speech for all to read, especially those who wanted to be there but couldn't make it.

Good Afternoon everyone. My name is Charlie Heege and I am the President of Branch 36 of the National Association of Letter Carriers. Happy St. Patrick's Day!

My family can't believe that I am not with them watching the parade! I told them that I had to be here with my second family because Saving Postal Jobs and Stopping the Closures of Post Offices and Mail Processing Plants is a high priority for me. I will meet up with them later!

March 17th has always been an important day for me growing up. It became an even bigger day when I joined Branch 36 back in 1979 and found out that March 17th is the day when 2500 members of Branch 36 got together only a couple of blocks from here to take a Strike Vote. That was 42 years ago today.

Back in 1970 the issue was wages and benefits. Letter Carriers in 1970 with a family of four were eligible for Food Stamps because their wages left them below the poverty line. We have come a long way since then.

Today's issue is the Survival of the Postal Service!

Unfortunately we have Postal Management in Washington, DC who are HELL BENT on destroying the Postal Service. AND we have some Members of Congress who want to help Postal Management destroy OUR Postal Service.

ARE WE Going To Let Them? HELL NO!

One of their Proposals is to Eliminate Saturday delivery! Eliminating Saturday delivery is the wrong proposal, a proposal that would negatively alter services to the public and to businesses, threaten the viability of our Postal Service, and will be the beginning of the end of the institution that has served our country for well over 200 years! Our First Postmaster General was Benjamin Franklin back in 1775. This is not what he envisioned for the Postal Service!

Those who would be most affected are, most importantly, the elderly, also residents of rural communities, those who need their mail order prescription medicine or other important goods on weekends, not to mention small businesses, that are open on weekends and need the ability to send and receive financial documents! Eliminating Saturday delivery would provide additional costs on all who are compelled to deal with other more expensive delivery companies. Taxpayers wouldn't save any money, because the taxpayers DON'T FUND THE POSTAL SERVICE, the Postal Service earns its revenue on its own, by selling stamps and services.

ARE WE GOING TO LET THEM ELIMINATE SATURDAY DELIVERY? HELL NO!

IT IS SIMPLE LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: cutting Saturday delivery is the wrong proposal. It is clearly the wrong way. Eliminating Saturday Delivery would sacrifice 17 percent of service AND only save 4 percent in costs! This is not a rational formula! This would drive customers away and further reduce revenues.

This will also jeopardize the Postal Service's ability to deliver goods that are ordered online. The Postal Service is continuously providing 'last-mile' delivery of these packages for FedEx and UPS. Our service is much more efficient than our competitors, but not if we allow them to destroy it.

ARE WE GOING TO LET THEM? HELL NO!

Growth was confirmed by Postal Service CFO Jim Corbett, who talked about a net operating profit of $200 million during the 2012 fiscal year's first quarter. He said it was 'driven by strong growth in online merchandise sales'. This is up 7 percent from last year's first quarter.. We have growth potential! Why would they want to destroy that?!

When is the best day to deliver those packages? Saturday - when people are home.

The real burden facing the Postal Service is not in providing first class service to the public. The burden is from the mandate from Congress that the Postal Service be the only Government agency OR private firm that is required to prepay future retiree health care benefits! This Congressional mandate requires that the Postal Service prepay the next 75 years! And do so within a decade! This equates to $5.5 billion yearly!

Paying the government $5.5 billion dollars a year (a year!!!) accounts for 85 percent of the Postal Services debt ("red ink")!' This is a problem Congress created, and a problem that Congress needs to fix immediately!

We will continue to work with the friends we do have in Congress like Senators Kirstin Gillibrand from New York and Bernie Sanders from Vermont as well as work with our customers and our friends in the business community, to strike this proposal from pending legislation and President Obama's budget BEFORE it comes up for a vote! Yes you heard that correctly! Eliminating Saturday Delivery is proposed in President Obama's Proposed Budget.

President Obama deserves credit for addressing the issue of pre-funding future retiree health benefits in a short-term manner in his budget, but this is a long-term problem that needs a long-term solution

The shift to a 5-day delivery would sacrifice 80,000 full and part-time jobs, including 25,000 city carrier jobs, by adding that many hardworking Americans to unemployment lines is WRONG.

ARE WE GOING TO LET THEM? HELL NO!

I am very happy to see all of you here today but we must do more. All of us must be registered to vote and we must get our neighbors and family members to register to vote. AND WE MUST GET OUT THE VOTE. WE need to elect Members of Congress and US Senators that are in favor of SAVING POSTAL JOBS and who are in favor of stopping the Postal Service from closing Post Offices and Mail Processing Plants.
ARE WE GOING TO REGISTER TO VOTE?? HELL YES!!
ARE WE GOING TO VOTE FOR OUR FRIENDS?? HELL YES!!
Thank You. Happy St. Patrick's Day!

The truth is billionaires want more and more money. They know that unions created and help to maintain the middle class. The 1% billionaires look at the middle class wages as money out of their pockets, money that could be added to their bottom line. To them, the elimination of union jobs is the elimination of the middle class. They will be happy if we all work at minimum wage, at part-time jobs without benefits, but we have something more powerful than the 1% super PACs. We have the right to vote. We have the right to turn off the TV and radio when the 1%'s brainwashing commercials come on. We have the right to vote for candidates who are going to improve the lives of workers. We have the right to vote for candidates who will ensure that our senior citizens have access to Social Security and Medicare. We also have the right to forget about side issues such as abortion, gun control, and others and focus on our wallets.

What I am asking all of the proud members of Branch 36, NALC is to show your pride by registering to vote and vote for pro-union candidates. We, as union members, are not the bad guys. They want all to believe that we are bad guys because we want a living wage that would allow us to send our kids to college. They want all to believe that we are the bad guys because we demand health insurance benefits to take care of sick members of our family. They want all to believe that we are bad guys because we want retirement pensions after working thirty years on-the-job

.We have to stop this brainwashing perpetrated by the 1% and stand up and show our pride as union members. If you have a union T-shirt, wear it in public. Show your pride. Do not allow the 1% such as Congressman Issa (R. Calif.) who is the richest member of Congress, to strip postal workers of our hard fought-for wages, health benefits, and pensions. Issa's legislation HR 2309 would do just that and make all of us part-time employees.

We all must be involved and remain up-to-date on all postal legislation. We were successful in stopping a vote on HR 2309 and S 1789 in the U.S. Senate, but they can reintroduce those U.S. Postal Service destructive legislative bills at anytime. Become a NALC E-activist by going to: www.NALC.org. You will receive alerts and updates.

The NALC is presently in contract negotiations under mediation. Don't think that the Issa's in Congress aren't looking over the P.M.G.'s shoulders to see what he may agree to. If the two parties, NALC and U.S.P.S., are left alone to negotiate in good faith, I believe an agreement is possible.

Let's show the 1% that the 99% have many more votes and use our votes to increase the numbers making up the middle class and not allow the 1% to destroy it.

Branch 36 and our national officers are doing everything possible to Save America's Postal Service but it is going to take all members and their families to get involved.

We must defeat HR 2309 in the House and make changes to S1789 in the Senate. Both of these bills as written can be detrimental to the Postal Service. HR 2309 has no redeeming qualities. It is out to destroy the Postal Service. S1789 has some good intentions, but as written will eliminate Saturday delivery in two years. It only reduces the heavy burden of paying future retiree health benefits by a small margin. These payments need to stop until the Postal Service is profitable and has a surplus.

Everyone needs to call your Member of the House of Representatives and tell them to vote NO on HR 2309 and tell your U.S. Senators that S1789 as written is not good enough.

As I wrote above, it was a job well-done gathering signatures just as it was a job well-done manning the rallies on September 27th. I thank all of you.

We also asked Congress to co-sponsor H.R. 137 which is a resolution to keep six-days of mail delivery. We were successful in many ways. We started Tuesday with 216 co-sponsors of H.R. 1351 and around 150 co-sponsors of H.R. 137. By Wednesday, we had 220 co-sponsors of H.R. 1351 and over 200 cosponsors of H.R. 137. We now have a majority to move the legislation to the floor for a vote. This is non-partisan legislation. This is to save America's Postal Service. This is both a Democrat and Republican issue.

We also asked Congress not to co-sponsor H.R. 2309 (lssa-R-CA). This Issa bill is better known as the "Postal Destruction Act." Representative lssa wants forced layoffs, forced retirements and the closures of thousands of Postal facilities. To date, he has one co-sponsor, his buddy from Florida, Ross (R). Let's keep it this way.

Branches had very little notice prior to September 27th to get these rallies together. The rallies had to take place this week because Congress was scheduled to be in their local offices. Branch 36 was told that we were the lead organization at two Congressional offices, those being Congressman Nadler and Congressman Serrano. NALC/Branch 36 congressional liaisons were asked to do the organizing, Natan Sheyer is the C.D.L. for Nadler and Jose Ramos is for Serrano. They both obtained rally permits from the N.Y.P.D. and sent out flashes to every Branch 36 station. Branch 36 officers split up all the stations and visited the carriers on the workfloor to make sure every carrier knew the importance of these rallies.

The A.P.W.U. were the leads for Congresswoman Maloney, Congressmen Rangel and Crowley's offices. We decided to give carriers the option of attending any one of the five Congressional offices. I am very happy to say that we had over 1500 participants collectively at these five locations. C.D.L. Donna Thompkins and C.D.L. Carmen Flores did an outstanding job organizing the hundreds of carriers who showed up at the offices of Charles Rangel and Carolyn Maloney.

I attended the rally at Nadler's office along with John Springman and N.Y.S. ALC President George Mangold and 400 carriers. Just as Congressman Nadler came out of his office to speak to us, we heard the beat of drums. We were happy to have the "Occupy Wall Street" demonstrators join us. This brought us close to 500 people. All were very respectful and thankful to Congressman Nadler who is a co-sponsor of H.R. 1351 and H.R. 137. Nadler had encouraging words for the Postal crowd and the Wall Street crowd. It was nice to have a drumbeat as we chanted our Save America's Postal Service slogans. I encourage all who can to join the "Occupy Wall Street" demonstrations. Their message is to point out that Wall Street/Banks received bailouts, but college graduates who can't find a job, get no help to pay their student loans.

Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney and Congressmen Rangel and Serrano also came out and spoke to our rally participants. All five of these members of Congress are co-sponsors of H.R. 1351.

Tony Ortiz took the lead at Congressman Serrano's office and Harold Hillard and Pat McNally took the lead with C.D.L. Donna Thompkins at Congressman Rangel's office. C.D.L. Carmen Flores took the lead at Congresswoman Maloney's office. Congressman Serrano did not leave the rally until he shook every participant's hand!

I noticed at Nadler's rally and the other Branch 36 rallies by looking at the photos and videos, that non-members also participated. Branch 36 is allowing active non-members to join the NALC without payment of a year's back dues, during the month of October. We need all carriers acting as one in solidarity in these strange times that we live in.

I am positive that more rallies will follow. Thank you to all of you who feel this was important enough to come out and have your voice heard.

My son is working in Wisconsin with, "We Are Wisconsin." He will tell you that too many voters stayed home on the last election day in Wisconsin and as a result, the State Legislature and the governor were able to strip state workers of their right to negotiate a contract! The people of Wisconsin woke up and recalled nine of their senators. The recall elections are taking place this month. Hopefully, the voters will go to the voting booths this time and give back to their teachers and their firemen their rights.

You would think that this is enough to worry about. It is not. We have postal management in Washington, D.C. working the media with half-truths. Yes, the Postal Service is having financial problems. No, eliminating Saturday delivery is not the solution. Instead of sending out press releases only talking about Saturday delivery and closings of thousands of post offices, they need to tell the real story. The real story is that the Postal Service is the only entity in America that has to pre-pay future retirees' health benefits at 5.5 billion a year. The Postal Service is required to prepay the next 75 years of future retirees' health benefits and pay the total amount in ten years! These future retirees are not even born yet! Management also needs to elaborate on the overpayment that the Postal Service made to the Civil Service Retirement System and the Federal Employees Retirement System, totaling over 80 billion dollars.

Besides the above, the Postal Service should remove "service" from its name. They are bent on removing Saturday delivery service and closing post offices. The U.S. Postal better describes it. I am sure this is not what Ben Franklin had in mind.

Welcome to the National Association of Letter Carriers Branch 36 "19th Annual Food Drive Kickoff." I look forward to this nationwide food drive every year. The letter carriers of Branch 36 deliver mail six days a week in all communities on every block of Manhattan and the Bronx. It makes me very proud to see Branch 36 Letter Carriers help their fellow New Yorkers. We live in one of the world's richest and most influential cities, yet we have people going to bed hungry. Many of these hungry New Yorkers are children. Letter Carriers become members of the communities
that they deliver mail to and know many of those who do not have enough food to feed their families and know them by their first names.

It was a great feeling last year when the record amount of food collected was 77.1 million pounds nationwide, putting us over the one billion pounds point collected since its inception in 1992. We are now in a race to reach two billion pounds or to Stamp Out Hunger, whichever comes first.

The NALC chose the second Saturday in May for our national food drive because research shows that at that time most food bank and pantry food supplies are at their lowest.

It is also the time of year when children get out of school for the summer and no longer have the hot meals that schools provide when in session. This puts an increased burden on already struggling New Yorkers to feed their families.

Here in Manhattan, there are over two hundred food banks and pantries serving our food deprived neighbors. All donated food that we collect in Manhattan will be distributed by City Harvest to pantries and food banks right here in Manhattan and food collected in the Bronx will stay in the Bronx.

We would not be as successful if we did not have partners who want to stamp out hunger as much as we do. I mentioned City Harvest. They collect the food from us and distribute it. This makes our efforts a lot easier. Thank You City Harvest!

The US Postal Service is one partner making it possible for letter carriers to collect food as they deliver mail along their routes. The Postal Service not only allows Letter Carriers to collect food on the clock but also allows usage of their fleet of trucks to transport food donations to central points so City Harvest can pick it up. This year the Postal Service printed up Stamp Out Hunger pins for all Letter carriers to wear promoting the food drive. Letter Carriers in Manhattan and the Bronx were also given permission to wear Food Drive T-shirts during this week. The T-shirts depict a Stamp Out Hunger cartoon created by cartoonists Jeff and Bill Keane which they donate in support of our food drive. Thank you to District Manager Bill Schnaars and Postmaster Bob Brown. The Postal Service also allows the Campbell Soup company to mail out over 82 million postcards for free promoting the food drive. Campbell Soup Company also donates one million cans of soup for our drive. Another national partner is Valpak. Valpak promotes our food drive by placing an ad on the front of their blue envelopes and sends it to 44 million households. This year we also have the National Rural Letter Carriers, the AFL-CIO, The United Way and Uncle Bob's Self Storage as national partners.

On a local level I have two energetic, enthusiastic letter carriers who have volunteered again this year to be Branch 36's Food Drive Coordinators. They are Orlando Gonzalez and David Velazquez. They have been to every post office in Manhattan and the Bronx, getting everyone excited about breaking all records this year. Thank you Orlando and David. Representing the NY Post Office is Pete Fontana. Thank you Pete.

Now we need all New Yorkers to join us in making 2011 the biggest year ever by collecting food donations for our neighbors who are in need. Please bring canned and dry foods to your nearest post office during the week of May 7th to May 14th. Thank You.

House Resolution 137

House Resolution 137 calls for the Postal Service to keep six-day delivery of mail. The resolution was submitted to the House by Republican Congressman Bob Graves. We need everyone to call their House of Representatives member to sign on as a co-sponsor just as our good friend Carolyn Maloney did. Carolyn signed on as a co-sponsor after receiving a call from NALC Congressional Liaison Carmen Flores. Carmen does an outstanding job representing NALC members. Carmen understands the importance of keeping in constant contact with our friends in Congress, especially now, due to the barrage of attacks on workers. The Wisconsin Legislature was able to strip the collective bargaining rights of state workers and signed into law by the governor. Now the citizens of Wisconsin are in the process of recalling these legislators. Hopefully, the rallies will continue until these Union busters are sent packing. Unfortunately, other states with similar actions against workers are going on.

I don't understand their mentality. They'd rather have teachers making minimum wages and have no benefits. They want teachers to work 30 plus years and have no pension or health benefits when they retire. What they're saying is they do not want a middle-class.

If this is not a wakeup call to all workers in America, then I don't know what is. Wisconsin voters were fooled into voting these legislators into office or did workers stay home on Election Day? We all need to realize that none of us can afford to stay home on election days. Because of a Supreme Court ruling, big business can donate huge amounts of money to candidates who are anti-union. The only way to counter that besides contributing to COLCPE is to get out the vote.

I am happy and surprised to hear that the clerks union negotiated a tentative collective bargaining agreement with the U.S. Postal Service. I am surprised because I did not think the Postal Service would come to the table and negotiate a contract with pay raises and C.O.L.A. provisions contained within. There are many new aspects to this tentative agreement. It now has to go out to the members of the A.P.W.U. for a vote. The members will decide whether or not to accept this agreement.

Our contract expires in November of this year. Our national officers are
well-prepared for negotiations.

I received an interesting phone call from a Branch 36 retiree telling me to have the national officers add retiree provisions to our C.B.A. such as subsidies to retirees to offset health benefits premiums. He also suggested that we stop eyeglass and dental vouchers as well as scholarships and retiree brunches to fund these subsidies. Where do I begin to answer this? Firstly, our C.B.A. is only for active letter carriers. Retirees are governed under either the Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS) or the Federal Employees Retirement System (FERS) as outlined in Chapter 83 and 84 of Title 5 U.S. Code. These are administered by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM). Changes to the CSRS or FERS would take an Act of Congress. We have had to fight changes such as raising the retirement age and changes to the retirement formula.

Secondly, I found out that this retiree has one of the highest premium health benefit plans in FEHBP. He is not in the NALC plan. I don't understand why any retiree, especially those who have Medicare, is enrolled in any other health plan other than the NALC Health Plan. The premiums are lower and benefits are greater. I would venture to guess that the reason is that his doctor is not affiliated with CIGNA PPO. Maybe it is time to find another doctor or talk your doctor into becoming a member of CIGNA

Thirdly, retirees pay $2.00 a month in dues. Portions of the $2.00 go to National and our State Association. It doesn't leave much to establish a subsidy fund. The Branch 36 eyeglass voucher which allows a member in good standing to obtain a pair of glasses and our four scholarships awarded to our members' children each year, do not come from dues money. The eyeglass vouchers and scholarships are awarded and administered by the Branch 36 Welfare and Scholarship Fund. This fund is subsidized by the sale of raffle books which every member received in the mail in December, with the drawing in March, and by our Dinner-Dance Journal book, by the sale of ads. The raffle book returns are not coming in at a level which would maintain a healthy fund. Please either buy or sell the $10.00 raffle book and return the ticket stubs and check to Branch 36 as soon as possible. I do not want to be the president who is forced to stop the eyeglass vouchers and scholarships.

Fourthly, I will not be the president to stop the Retiree Brunch. I look forward every year to seeing our retirees at our Brunch. The wealth of information that they share is priceless. I empathize with this retiree in that no one wants to pay higher health plan premiums. He should take a good hard look at the NALC Health Plan in the next open season and save money, with better benefits. Although I empathize, I do not see the benefit in stopping eyeglass and dental vouchers, scholarships and the Retiree Brunch to subsidize high cost health plans, especially when money could be saved by being enrolled in the letter carrier owned plan - the NALC Health Plan.

Our national officers continue to fight on the Hill to save six-day mail delivery. All of you can help by being on payroll deductions for COLCPE. One dollar a pay period is all that I am asking. You can also help by being a NALC Eactivist which only requires an e-mail address. You will receive e-mails from the NALC when there is a call to action, and last but not least, you need to be registered to vote and vote for friends of letter carriers.

Denis emigrated to the U.S. from Colon, Republic of Panama in 1969, after playing four years of professional baseball as a center fielder. Denis could not continue as a baseball player due to a leg injury.

Denis and his wife Barbara have two children, Natalie and Denis, Jr., and one grandson Chase.

Winfred started in the Postal Service in 1982 after five years with the Veteran's Administration. Winfred's union activity began at the V.A. serving as Vice-President of the employees' union. Winfred's union activity with Branch 36 grew after attending his first NALC national convention in Atlantic City in 1994. He attended every state and national convention ever since.

Winfred showed concern for his fellow carriers' safety in F. D. R. Station and he was asked to represent all Manhattan carriers as Branch 36 Safety Officer for Manhattan. Winfred was instrumental in creating a new position on the Board of Officers titled Director of Safety and Health, which represented carriers in Manhattan and the Bronx. He was the first to hold this position.

Winfred was elected as a shop steward by his peers in 2008. He was the chairman on this Dinner-Dance Committee from 2007 to 2009. Upon retirement he became the manager/treasurer of the Empire Branch 36 Credit Union.

Winfred's wife Cecilla was also born in the Republic of Panama. Winfred has two daughters, Jasmin and Ashley, and one granddaughter Priscilla Joyce.

We also recognized three deserving people who volunteered for Branch 36 functions. They were Cynthia Lim, Elizabeth Montenegro and the most active retiree, Ruby Almeida.

We were honored with the attendance of four national officers: Brian Hellman, Myra Warren, Randy Keller and newly reelected Region 15 NBA Larry Cirelli.

Our dinner dance committee chaired by Carmen Flores did a great job. Close to 600 participants had a wonderful time.

We had our family picnic in F.D.R. State Park. The novelty must have worn off because the turnout was not as good as past years. Those who did show up had an enjoyable time with plenty of food and beverages as well as organized games for the kids.

This video is a tribute to all our brother and sister carriers from 1970 who helped change letter carriers from below poverty level job status to the middle-class. I want to thank these carriers on behalf of today's carriers who are the beneficiaries of their hard-fought battles and successes.

All of our national officers were up for reelection. Nominations took place at this convention. I had the honor and privilege of nominating our own Brian Hellman as Director of NALC Health Benefit Plan. I was joined at the microphone by all of our delegation who have the NALC Health Plan, which is the majority of our delegates. I am very proud to say Brian was elected by acclamation. Our national President Fred Rolando was also reelected by acclamation, as well as all NALC resident officers and trustees. Our National Business Agent Larry Cirelli has a challenge. All Branch 36 members in good standing will receive the ballot in the mail in early October. Exercise your right to vote, and send back your ballot. You will receive literature letting you know who our Branch officers and shop stewards are endorsing. Please vote.

As a NALC AFL-CIO delegate, I had the honor of accompanying AFL-CIO President Rich Trumka onstage when he addressed the delegates on the final day of the convention. After Rich's speech, the NALC made many buses available to take all convention delegates who did not have to make flights home to Los Angeles City Hall for a rally for jobs. Over 3,000 NALC delegates were bused to L.A., which is 30 minutes away from Anaheim Convention Center.

I look forward to September every year because I get to see carriers at our Annual Retiree Brunch. Over 170 carriers attended this year. Everyone was disappointed that Vince Sombrotto could not attend. We were all happy and honored that our NALC President Fred Rolando was able to attend. Fred was gracious enough to bring the video commemorating the 40th Anniversary of The Great Postal Strike with him. Our new venue, Hard Rock Café Theatre, has the capability of showing the video on a screen 50 feet by 25 feet, as well as a dozen flat screen T.V.'s. We also honored two retirees who became 60-year members, and four retirees who received 50-year Gold Cards. For most of those in attendance it was their first opportunity to hear President Fred Rolando. They were very favorably impressed and I thank Fred for opening his busy schedule to attend our Retiree Brunch. Attendees were also well-impressed with our NBA Larry Cirelli who also spoke.

Now that summer is coming to a close, it is time to get out the vote for our friends running for election to Congress. We cannot afford a light turnout in these midterm elections. We have enough friends in Congress at present to ensure six-day delivery. Let's keep it that way. Please get out the vote!

Background:
The Postal Regulatory Commission (PRC) is holding field hearings throughout the summer focused on the effects of cutting Saturday mail delivery. As part of this process, the PRC is accepting comments from the public. These comments will play a crucial role in the PRC's recommendation to the United States Congress about whether to maintain six-day delivery.

Since this campaign is dedicated to saving Saturday delivery, the NALC believes that Saturday is the best day to contact these businesses about weighing in to support Saturday delivery. Regardless of what day you decide to contact these businesses, an active letter carrier should not participate while on their route, in uniform or on the USPS clock. Any NALC retired member may contact these businesses at anytime.

Only with your help will this campaign be successful. If you follow these 5 simple steps, you will be part of saving Saturday delivery.

Step 1: Contact local businesses or organizations in your community that you think would be supportive of maintaining Saturday delivery, such as those that are open on Saturday.

Step 2: Provide them with the attached fact sheet on the impact of cutting
Saturday delivery.

Step 3: Ask them to post a comment on the Postal Regulatory Commission's website voicing their opposition to eliminating Saturday delivery: http://www.nrc.gov/prc-pages/aboutlcontact/default.aspx In this packet there is a Business Fact sheet and step by step instructions for the business owner. Before leaving this information, be sure to provide your personal email address in the space provided on the instruction sheet.

Step 4: After the business or organization posts a comment to the PRC, they will receive a confirmation email. Please ask them to forward you their confirmation email (to the address you provided to them). If you don't receive an email, please follow up with the business or organization until you receive it.

Step 5: Once you have received the email, please forward it to NALC HQ at savesaturdaydelivery@gmail.com so that you can receive credit for doing your part to save Saturday delivery and the future of the Postal Service.

The NALC plans to recognize your efforts at this year's National Convention in Anaheim. NALC HQ is tracking all of your efforts.

I start out by asking the carriers if they are tired of listening to the propaganda of the Postal Service in trying to get everyone to believe that six-day mail delivery is a thing of the past. Carriers who read the Outlook and the NALC magazine Postal Record, know that the Postal Service does not have the power to eliminate a day of mail delivery. Only Congress has the power to change the number of mail delivery days.

The way this works in Congress is the Appropriation Committee comes up with a spending bill and attached to this bill is what's called a rider. This rider mandates the Postal Service to deliver mail six days a week. This procedure must be followed each year. It was done this year.

If we had a vote in Congress today, I am positive that they would vote to keep the sixday delivery intact. We have enough support from both Democrats and Republicans to do so, but we all know that this is an election year which means we all have to be registered to vote, as well as our spouses and kids over 18 years of age and actually vote for friends of letter carriers. Vote for candidates who are in favor of keeping six-day mail delivery.

If you listen to the message of the Postal Service, they want you to believe that the public and postal employees are in favor of eliminating Saturday delivery. The Postal Service's survey given to some of the public, contains pointed questions such as, "Would you rather pay a lot more for postage or get rid of Saturday delivery?" They are also telling employees that they will have weekends off.

I recommend that you not be fooled by this propaganda and see the real picture. There is an interview in the Washington Post with Postmaster General Potter in which he is quoted as saying he wants to eliminate Saturday and Tuesday delivery of mail. We can all do the math. Four days of mail delivery makes us all part-time employees. Postal management would be able to accomplish this without the mandate from Congress.

Changing the number of delivery days is not the answer to the Postal Service's financial problems. The problem is with the 2006 Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act. This Act places unachievable demands on the Postal Service thanks to the miscalculations made by the Office of Personnel Management. O.P.M. has made two major miscalculations with respect to the Act. In the Act, the Postal Service is mandated to prefund future retiree health benefits for the next 75 years and pay it within ten years. First of all, no other agency nor other employer is required to prefund future retiree health benefits. O.P.M. calculated that health benefit costs will increase at 7% a year and told Congress that the Postal Service needs to pay 5.5 billion a year for ten years and 2.5 billion a year to cover present day employee health benefits. Experts have stated that this is grossly over inflated. The experts state that 2.5 a year for ten years would be closer to the mark, not 5.5 billion.

O.P.M. was also asked to calculate the Postal Service's overpayment to the Civil Service Retirement System. O.P.M. came up with 17 billion in overpayments. It has been determined that this is grossly understated. It is actually 75 billion in overpayments. What everyone needs to realize is that the Postal Service would have shown a profit rather than a loss if the overpayment to CSRS was used to prefund future retiree health benefits and pay off the Postal debt of 10.2 billion.

Only Congress can fix this mess. P.M.G. Potter told Congress that there wouldn't be a need to eliminate Saturday delivery if the 75 billion was credited to the Postal Service. After this interview in the Washington Post, I don't believe anything he has to say. This is why we have to do everything in our power to keep six-day delivery.

Other shipping companies are already planning on how they will deliver on Saturdays. They realize that companies such as pharmaceutical deliveries and fruit shippers and DVD rentals will be looking for alternatives to the Postal Service. I am certain that these delivery companies will talk their new Saturday customers into using them all week.

The public has voted the Postal Service as the number one trusted government agency for the last five years. This equates to letter carriers in my opinion because the public sees us on a daily basis. The public sees our nationwide food drive, our fundraising for MDA, our Carrier Alert program. The public does not want to see other delivery companies using their mailboxes, which may happen without a Saturday delivery. We need to continue feeding the hungry, finding a cure, looking out for the elderly and homebound and deliver medicines in an emergency, but we must also continue to deliver six days each week.

There are three things we all need to do: 1.) register to vote and vote 2.) become a NALC E-Activist and 3.) donate to COLCPE through payroll deduction.

If we don't elect friends of letter carriers to Congress, the Postal Service may get their way. NALC E-Activists receive e-mails from the NALC when action is needed. I am asking for one dollar per pay period from every carrier in Branch 36 for COLCPE. That is one less coffee every two weeks. Our full-time jobs are worth it.

Let's stop listening to the propaganda handed down from the defeatists in upper management and become pro-active. I know carriers have many revenue-generating ideas to help the Postal Service be successful in this economy.

Together, I believe we will stop Postal management from destroying the Postal Service

Vince was given the microphone upon his arrival. After a long-standing ovation, Vince gave a history of what led up to the strike and what happened during the strike and after the strike.

We also had nine additional carriers come up to the microphone to share their experiences during the strike. Five are retirees: Matty Dimmler, Herman Dixon, Bertram S. Knight, Ruby Almeida, and Joe Ramos. Three continue to deliver mail: Gene Spry, Marshall Alvarado, and Charlie Bond. One is Branch 36 First Vice-President/Treasurer Harold Hillard. All spoke from the heart. You could hear the passion in their voices. All these carriers thanked Vince for being their leader during the strike and all that he has done for carriers over the years.

I pointed out the twelve framed panels that line one of the walls of Branch 36's Percy T. McRae Meeting Hall which tell the Great Postal Strike story. These panels can also be found on our website: www.NYLCBR36.ORG.

Many junior carriers were surprised to hear Vince and others talk about how the salary in 1970 made carriers eligible for food stamps and welfare. The top salary in 1970 was around $9,000.00 and The Bureau of Labor Statistics at that time reported that a family of four needed $11,500.00 as an income just to get by. Many carriers held two and three jobs to make ends meet.

We videotaped this meeting and hope to have it available to view on our website.

John Springman and I were also privileged to attend a celebration of the 40th Anniversary of the Great Postal Strike, which took place in the Smithsonian's Postal Museum in Washington, D.C. There were three guest speakers: Vince Sombrotto, Bill Burrus, APWU President and George Gould, former Congressional Aide and NALC lobbyist.

Vince was first to speak. He went into depth on what led up to the strike and how he created the "Rank and File" movement of the NALC. Vince spoke about the Bronx carriers from Kingsbridge and Throgs Neck stations who called a sickout in July, 1969. He spoke about being promised a raise by Congress which was stopped by then president, Richard M. Nixon, so he could receive a 100% raise, and Congress could receive a 40% raise in pay. Vince also spoke about all the strikes taking place at the time in New York that resulted in huge contractual gains.

Bill Burrus joked that what can one say after hearing from the man that started the strike and how Vince spoke for over forty minutes without notes.

Bill went on to talk about his experiences as a clerk in Cleveland during the strike. George Gould who worked for Congress at the time of the strike, gave Congress' perspective of the strike. This panel answered questions from the 100 plus participants, which included NALC President Fred Rolando and former NALC President Bill Young.

The entire proceeding was videotaped live onto Youtube. We have a link to the video on our website.

Gene Spry keeps order at our meetings as Sergeant-At-Arms. No one has signed up more carriers into the NALC Health Plan as our Health Benefits Representative Tom Nelson.

Nori Amill signs up carriers for the NALC's Mutual Benefits. Howie Arotsky keeps on top of route adjustments as our Director of City Delivery. Orlando Gonzalez keeps everyone informed as Editor of the Outlook, and through the Outlook, Kathy Kirton writes articles as Director of Education. David Velazquez is a new part-time officer as Director of Safety and Health. David stepped up when Winfred Jenkins announced that he was retiring after hip surgery.

I look forward to continuing as Branch 36 President. There will continue to be challenges with the Postal Service that we will deal with. The biggest challenge is convincing postal management in Washington, D.C. to see how futile it will be to lose six-day mail delivery. Another challenge this year will be to keep our friends in Congress. Congressional members will be the ones deciding on whether or not we keep six-day mail delivery.

I also thank our committee chairs who do an outstanding job. They are: Mike Perdomo, MDA Fundraiser Chair; Roberto Perez, Legislative Chair; Miguel Amill and Kathy Kirton, Picnic Chairs; Sheila Mitchell, Election Chair; Orlando Gonzalez and David Velazquez, Food Drive Chairs; Winfred Jenkins, Dinner-Dance Chair; Sonny Guadalupe, Welfare and Scholarship Chair; and the person who keeps us number one in Customer Connect, Orlando Gonzalez.

None of us would be successful without all the volunteers who come out at every event. Thanks again.

In the 30 plus years as a carrier, 2009 will go down as the worst I have seen as far as mail volume goes. Companies drastically lowered their advertising budgets which translated to lower mail volume for the Postal Service

2009 was the year Article 12 played a big role in the Postal Service especially in the clerk craft. Our craft is not immune to Article 12’s excessing provisions. With reduction in mail volume and the implementation of Flat Sorting machines, we too can be subject to excessing. New York City is not scheduled for the flat sorting machines anytime soon, but surrounding areas are, such as New Jersey and Long Island. This affects residual vacancies which are held for the possibility of excessed carriers coming here from other Postal Districts. This also has a domino effect. We have part-time flexible carriers waiting to make regular and Transitional Carriers waiting for the hiring freeze to end to become career employees.

We started the year with high expectations of our new President in the White House. I for one was not expecting a quick fix to the nation’s problems. It took eight years to make this mess. Let’s give Mr. Obama more time. Hopefully the White House will focus on creating jobs in 2010.

We did have successes in the legislative front. FERS employees will be able to count their sick-leave toward their retirement benefits. We were also successful in lowering the Postal Service’s payment toward future retiree health benefits.

It was looking positive for healthcare reform from Congress, but then we had the U.S. Senator election in Massachusetts. The results of this election took away the majority in the Senate needed to pass healthcare reform. I am not giving up. There are too many Americans without healthcare. Perhaps they can come up with a bipartisan healthcare reform bill.

Even with the disappearance of overtime, Branch 36 carriers continued to attend MDA fund-raisers and continued to contribute to COLCPE. As in the past, whenever there is a disaster here at home or abroad carriers donate. I had the honor of donating $1796.00 to the Red Cross Haiti Disaster Relief Fund on behalf of Branch 36 carriers. A bulk of this money was collected at a MDA fund-raiser that we had on January 23rd by the participants.

I am hopeful that 2010 will be better than 2009. I don’t have a crystal ball, but how can it get worse?

MIARAP will continue in 2010 to be used to adjust routes. A newer version is due in March and is being negotiated at the present time. Branch presidents let our national officers know what we think are the pros and cons of MIARAP. One thing we do agree on is we do not want to go back to six-day count and inspections with management standing over carriers for a week and messing with the numbers.

One issue still on the table in 2010 is the six-day mail delivery. Our friends in Congress are against taking away the statute of six-day mail delivery but the Postal Service continues to keep it on the table. This equates to all of us actively working to keeping our friends in office. 2010 is an election year for all our House of Representatives and here in New York our U.S. Senator is up for reelection. We have to be NALC E-Activists, donate to COLCPE and Get Out The Vote on election day.

At first I couldn't believe the stories coming from shop stewards on how management is manipulating the numbers to reach their goals. I told the shop stewards to show me proof. Shop stewards have done just that. Some in management are changing clock rings to have no after 5:00 p.m. return times for carriers. Some are changing end tours, making deals with some carriers to make it up to them. THAT IS FRAUD!

In many of these stations management is changing carriers' clock rings from a foot route operation to a truck operation, even though these carriers are delivering mail on their routes. It seems that there isn't a problem with a carrier on a truck operation working after 5:00 p.m.

Here lies the problem. The carriers' route is not getting the credit for the time that the route was switched to a truck operation (737 or 738). We have the joint NALC and USPS MIARAP process that relies on actual clock hits to adjust routes. If we have a ten-hour route and only seven hours are showing on the foot route operation code, more territory will be added to this route. In most cases management is changing those operation codes without the knowledge of the carriers. Carriers find out in some cases when MIARAP comes into their station and adds to a route instead of reducing territory to make it an eight-hour route.

Management, in making these changes, does leave a fingerprint. They have to use their employee ID number in order to make these changes, which remain as part of the TAC reports.

We, the Branch 36 officers, have had a meeting with both Bronx and Manhattan Postmasters, and have asked for an investigation. It required a letter by me for a second follow-up meeting and grievances filed to make them realize that this is serious.

They did not take this seriously, even after one station manager was investigated by the Office of Inspector General because of a grievance filed by a shop steward resulting in this manager receiving a removal notice. This removal was grieved by the Supervisors' Association and it was modified to a seven-day suspension

They did not take it seriously when a shop steward proved that his manager was fudging the numbers. We showed that it is impossible to get the numbers he was getting. Upper management's first reaction was "but he is getting great numbers."

We have two additional stations where management agreed that they changed codes. The shop stewards in those stations grieved these violations. Through the grievance procedure, management agreed to change the clock rings back to the proper codes. In one station the assistant manager also agreed to issue corrective action to the linesupervisors who changed the codes. Meanwhile, I am sure that the supervisors were following this person's orders.

We will be meeting with upper management shortly. Carriers need to report to their shop stewards any clock ring changes that are in violation. This will only end with all carriers working with their shop stewards. Carriers should not fall into any traps by making deals with supervisors looking for shortcuts. You could end up being complicit in their fraudulent activities.

All of the NALC E-Activists deserve a big thank you. Your participation was a crucial part of this success. The rhetoric coming from the opposition was a big hurdle to step over, but we did it.

Bowlers are needed for the nationwide one-day Bowl-A-Thons taking place on Sunday, November 1st. We have two locations. One is in Harlem and one near l4th Street. The proceeds will benefit Muscular Dystrophy Association.