Postal Service Rights and Wrongs

U.S. Postal Service managers proved Bruce Webb’s point with the way they handled his letter to our editor.

Webb works for the Postal Service and is proud, as he proclaimed in his letter to The Times, that “postal workers move more mail faster and cheaper than anywhere else in the world.” But he has a less flattering view of his supervisors, having noted in the same letter that the efficiency and cost-effectiveness exist “despite some of the worst management in modern industrial society.”

That hurt Ron Arndt’s feelings. He supervises Webb and close to 90 others at the Van Nuys Post Office. Less than a fortnight after the letter was published, Webb received a missile himself--a disciplinary warning from Arndt placed in Webb’s personnel file. Webb was accused of violating a Postal Service Code of Ethics requiring conduct reflecting favorably on the service. Further “infractions” could bring dismissal, he has learned. But don’t get Supervisor Arndt wrong: “It is not my intent in any way, shape or form to deprive him of any of his rights.”

The Van Nuys postmaster defended the disciplinary action while refusing to take responsibility for it, which may betray some of the managerial weaknesses to which Webb referred in the first place. Could it happen again if Webb writes another letter to The Times, the postmaster was asked. “It would depend on what his response would be,” the postmaster said.

That may not be the last word, however. Webb has filed a grievance. That offers an opportunity for Postal Service managers to provide evidence that what Webb said about them was wrong.