Keep Buffalo Mail Operations Here
(Editors’ note: This article is a follow-up to a previous TPC article.)
Hi everyone, my name is Jamie and I've been friends with Jesse for over 20 years. We were at Adelphi together, both aspiring high school social studies teachers. I grew up in Levittown (yes that Levittown, the planned suburb where the GI bill helped WWII veterans and their families afford homes after war and where Black and Jewish people were turned away, but I digress) and now live in Buffalo.
So here's the thing. We all know Postmaster General DeJoy's "Delivering for America" plan is a load of crap. But one of the crappiest parts is a consolidation of several mail processing centers, known as Processing and Distribution Centers or P&DCs.
One of the areas being considered for this mess is Western New York. More specifically, the powers that be want to transfer the bulk of the processing from the Buffalo P&DC to Rochester. Then they want to turn the Buffalo plant into an LPC or Local Processing Center. LPCs are not yet a real thing but they would involve carriers having to go to the current plant as a central location to receive their workload and go back out to their area rather than just picking it up from their local post office.
There are a number of problems with this "proposed" move. I put it in quotes because it seems they're going through the public input motions but have already decided.
1. If this happens, it would mean that mail going from one part of Buffalo to another part of Buffalo would be sent to Rochester to be processed and then be sent back to Buffalo, which makes no sense and means it would take the mail at least twice as long to be delivered.
2. Even though they say the mail won't be delayed, the service impact would be significant and mail would certainly be delayed, possibly by at least several days.
3. It is a significant waste of resources. It would increase the amount of labor and fuel needed to travel greater distances, both the 70-90 miles between Buffalo and Rochester and the potential travel between the Buffalo plant and the suburbs.
4. They say there will be no career layoffs but if operations move, a lot of people will not be willing or able to go along. People who use public transportation will not be able to get there. People have families and lives here in Buffalo and can't just pick up and move. This is peoples' livelihoods we're talking about.
So a couple of weeks ago, there was a legally required public meeting to seek verbal commentary. Here is a link to a video of that meeting. Fair warning it's about 2 hours long.