Local Officers attend NPMHU Legislative Conference, Lobby Legislators on Capitol Hill

Local President Robert Losi, Vice President Dave West, Treasurer Tim
Dwyer, Central MA Branch President Craig Lauzon and Portsmouth NH
Branch President Mike Hickson joined Local Officers from around the
Country and our National Officers in Washington, DC to lobby key
legislators on Capitol Hill on Postal Reform.

After day of
preparation and training, with presentations from National President
John Hegarty, National Treasurer Mark Gardner, National Legislative
Director Roger Blacklow as well as presentations on Postal Reform
Legislation from Senator Tom Carper (D-DE) and Representative John
McHugh (R-NY) and a multitude of panel discussions and training from a
wide array of interested parties, representatives of Locals from across
the United States marched on Capitol Hill along with Regional Directors
and National Staff.

Local 301 Representatives paid visits to MA
Congressmen James McGovern and  John Tierney as well as Maine Senator
Susan Collins, New Hampshire Senator John Sununu and Rhode Island
Senator Lincoln Chaffee.  Your Local 301 representatives were
accompanied on many of these visits by National President John Hegarty,
National Treasurer Mark Gardner, National Legislative Director Roger
Blacklow, National Contract Administration Department Manager Bill
Flynn, Regional Director Ray Sokolowski and Assistant Regional Director
Terry Donahue. 

Key New England Congressional members of
Government Reform Committees were met by your representatives and fully
apprised of the NPMHU's position on several important portions of
pending legislation including:

• Our support for initiatives
  contained in proposed legislation regarding a correction to the Postal
  Service's overfunding of Civil Service Retirement Systems (CSRS) escrow
  fund, which if corrected woulld return over $3 billion dollars in
  Postal revenue to the Postal Service and potentially delay current
  projected rate increases.
• Our support for initiatives regarding
  returning the responsibility of funding CSRS retirement benefits for
  time spent in active military duty by Postal Employees to the US
  Department of the Treasury (where all other Federal Employees military
  service retirement benefits are funded, except for Postal Employees). 
• We
  informed members of Congress of our opposition to the 'Single Piece
  Parcel' initiative contained in the House version of the
  current proposed Postal Reform Legislation. The legislation as written
  in the House version of proposed Postal Reform Legislation would
  possibily force the Postal Service to stop offering parcel service to
  the public all together.
• We also notified our Legislators
  of our opposition to pending attempts in the Senate version of
  proposed Postal Reform Legislation to reduce Federal Employee
  Compensation Act (FECA) benefits for Postal Employees.  

Our
Congressional Representatives were also fully appraised of the fact
that the NPMHU supports an overwhelming percentage of the pending
legislation regarding giving the Postal Service the flexibility it
needs to compete in todays buisiness environment, while stressing that
our collective bargaining rights established by the Postal
Reorganization Act need not be dismantled.

We urge each and every
member of the NPMHU in our Local to get active by joining our National
Legislative Action Alert team by following the links to our National
Office's website.  Let your elected members of the Senate and the House
of Representatives know how you feel about pending Postal Reform
Legislation.  It's your job and your future at stake!.