Residents across the D.C. region have become increasingly frustrated over delays in mail deliveries, with last week’s snowstorms, a spike in coronavirus cases and long-standing problems with the U.S. Postal Service contributing to a breakdown in services.
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Julia Miller, who lives in the District’s Brightwood Park neighborhood, said she did not receive any mail from Dec. 30 to Jan. 9. A birthday card from her mother, who lives across town, took three weeks to arrive, she said. Some mail finally arrived again on Monday.
“It is disappointing that this is happening in the United States of America,” Miller said.
Arlington resident Diana Wahl said she received no mail between Dec. 27 and Jan. 9. She finally received some mail on Monday and Tuesday, but older mail — that she had seen photos of in “informed delivery” emails she receives from the Postal Service — has not yet arrived. One of those Postal Service emails showed a letter from Social Security on its way to her.
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Her estimated tax payments are due this month, but she doesn’t trust that the Postal Service will deliver them: “I’m afraid to put them in a mailbox.”
The postal problems were exacerbated by staffing issues due to layoffs and the coronavirus.
An American Postal Workers Union official said more than 250 postal employees in D.C. were let go near the end of the year. Although the union is trying to get more information about the layoffs, officials say similar layoffs have occurred across the country.
“They haven’t explained why they laid them off,” Ray Robinson, executive vice president of the American Postal Workers Union, said in an interview. “They said a lack of work. There’s clearly not a lack of work.”
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A former postal employee who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they fear retaliation said they were among a group of workers laid off from a Northwest Washington post office Dec. 31.
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The employee said they were hired as a nonpermanent employee in August and expected the position to last about a year. Since August, the employee said, they had worked 10-hour days, six days per week, routinely putting in overtime.
“We’re full of mail,” the employee said. “It’s constantly busy.”
However, the employee said some workers received a letter on Dec. 30 informing them that Dec. 31 would be their last day. One letter, obtained by The Washington Post, was dated Dec. 27 and titled “Letter of Separation for Lack of Work.”
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“If mail volume begins to increase and there is a need to hire additional employees in your category you will be contacted,” the letter said.
In a statement late Tuesday, Postal Service spokesman Tom Ouellette said conditions of employment vary from position to position. He said most areas in the Washington region “are experiencing regular mail deliveries,” although postal employees are out because of "unforeseen circumstances” in “isolated locations.”
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The Postal Service was authorizing overtime and delivering mail on Sundays to meet demand, among other efforts, according to the statement.
In an email on Monday, Postal Service spokesman Mark Wahl said the employment periods of approximately 40 “seasonal” workers — hired for the peak period between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day — expired Dec. 31. He also noted that some D.C. postal stations closed on Jan. 4 because of the weather but are now open.
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NBC Washington also reported Tuesday that more than 500 postal employees in Maryland and Virginia were out of work because of covid-19.
The office of D.C. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D) was trying to resolve more than 100 complaints about the Postal Service, mostly related to nondelivery — which she called a “chronic” problem.
“The solution is to give the post office more money,” she said in an interview. “It is the most important service … they have to service every single household in the country.”
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Norton added that Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, who has been widely criticized for a plan that would slow delivery times and raise prices, “has to go.”
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“All we need is a majority of the postal board to make that happen,” Norton said.
Federal Election Commission dismisses complaints against USPS chief DeJoy over alleged ‘straw-donor scheme’
Amid mail delays, protesters planned to gather Wednesday in D.C. ahead of a Postal Service board of governors meeting where new leadership will be selected.
Emily Yen, an organizer with the Democratic Socialists of America who helped plan the rally, said DeJoy’s plans will slow the mail, disenfranchising the 46 percent of Americans who voted by mail in the last election. The board probably will elect conservative leadership, she said, making it more difficult to replace the postmaster.
“I’ve been really disgusted by Postmaster DeJoy’s handling of the post office,” she said. “He’s really been trying to privatize the Postal Service. This will negatively impact millions of Americans.”
Ouellette said in a statement that DeJoy’s plan “achieves financial sustainability and service excellence, stabilizes the workforce, and delivers on the Post Office’s universal service obligation.”