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The Daily Tar HeelWednesday, September 6, 19893
irate increase
Posttmasteir proposes first-class sta
mo
u
By KIMBERLY MAXWELL
Staff Writer
U.S. Postmaster General Anthony
Frank has proposed a stamp increase
for all first-class mail from 25 cents to
an amount between 28 and 32 cents,
effective in 1991.
The rate increase will be necessary
because of normal postal inflation, said
Bill Henderson, field division manager
for the Greensboro division of the Postal
Service.
"Postal inflation goes up 4 to 5 per
cent a year," Henderson said. "That's
postal economy, but it is not unusual.
After about three years, the inflation
has gone up about 12 percent. The third
year, we usually have a shortfall of
revenue. The law mandates that we
break even."
. The predicted shortfall for the Postal
Service this year will be about $1.7
billion with a total budget of $30 bil
lion, Henderson said.
If approved, the increase would come
three years after the cost of a stamp
went up from 22 cents to 25 cents in
January 1988.
The main issue for the Postal Service
is a federal requirement that employees
deliver the mail anywhere with a mail
box, Henderson said. As a result, the
Postal Service cannot close locations
that are not cost-effective.
Rising health benefits for postal
employees is another cause for this
revenue shortfall, Henderson said. The
federal government provides a health
benefiLpackage to all employees, but
the cost of benefits has increased 30 to
35 percent, which is consistent with the
private sector.
Labor contract negotiations are to
begin in spring 1990 for the Associa
tion of Postal Workers Union, Hender
son said. Making a new contract will be
a major obstacle for the Postal Service.
This union includes clerks, maintenance
personnel and mail drivers. Their con
tract will expire Nov. 20, 1990. There
will be some advance notice to the
union's demands, but their strategies
will remain unknown.
The Postal Service has taken meas
ures to prevent a rate increase, Hender
son said. One thousand jobs were elimi
nated, and studies are being conducted
to find areas where more jobs can be
cut. The Postal Service is also in the
process of becoming completely auto
mated. Its goal is to have the letter-mail
stream completely automated by 1995.
-Sophisticated machinery is included
in this automation plan, Henderson said.
"We want to stabilize our service."
The Postal Service's costs are out of
control, said John Crutcher of the Postal
Rate Commission. The Postal Service's
costs have been increasing about 9
percent annually, which is far above
the nation's inflation rate.
The Postal Rate Commission and
the Postal Board of Governors are the
two groups that regulate the U.S. Postal
Service. Each committee member is
appointed by the president and con
firmed by the U.S. Senate. The mem
bers serve six-year terms.
Several reasons can account for the
increasing costs, Crutcher said. The
total expense for processing and deliv
ering mail is substantially higher than it
used to be.
Management is another factor,
Crutcher said. "There are too many
supervisors and too many levels of
bureaucracy. Over the last 18 years,
successive management people have
bargained away in union agreements
work rules so that managers can't work
efficiently to control costs."
Crutcher cites the competition on
package delivery between the U.S.
Postal Service and United Parcel Serv
ice (UPS) as an example. Twenty-five
years ago, the Postal Service handled
all package deliveries. Now it only
handles 5 percent. Because the union
for the Postal Service gave away all the
work rules, costs skyrocketed mak
ing the competition easier for UPS.
The last factor is automation,
Crutcher said. "The problem is not with
automation itself, because it has been
incredibly productive. In general, postal
management hasn't reduced the num
ber of workers. It has been done in
some jurisdictions, but some have been
reluctant to do so."
Reducing workers in place of auto
mation is vital to decreasing costs,
Crutcher said.
The blame for the Postal Service's
internal costs cannot be placed on the
postmaster general, Crutcher said. The
Postal Service employs 825,000 people
more than any other corporation in "
the private sector and second in gov-;'
eminent only to the Armed Forces. He
said Frank has tried to control the"
managerial segment to decrease costs,
but because of the Postal Service's size,
it has been difficult.
The public will probably not appre-.
ciate a rate increase, Henderson said. .
"The public never reacts favorably to.
an increase. They must weigh the value; :
of the service we provide. Public reac-.-tions
will demand to know more about
the Postal Service's cost-cutting ef-,
forts. The current postage is the lowest;
in the world."
The cost of postage has increased 92
percent since 1972, Henderson said.
The cost of bread has gone up 161 '
percent since 1975, and the cost of gum
has increased 400 percent. "Nothing's
a quarter anymore," he said. "It's a
heck of a bargain."
Ethnic strife intensifies within Soviet republics of Azerbaijan, Moldavia
From Associated Press reports
MOSCOW Strikes spawned by
disputes between rival ethnic groups
spread Tuesday to more factories and
businesses in Moldavia and Azerbaijan,
sources in the two republics said.
In Azerbaijan, a nationalist group is
calling on Moscow to give it control of
the disputed Azerbaijani enclave of
Nagorno-Karabakh, which is populated
mainly by ethnic Armenians.
In Moldavia, members of the ethnic
Russian minority have gone on strike to
protest a law that makes Moldavian the
republic's official language.
Javad Salamov, a member of the
People's Front in Azerbaijan and a strike
committee member, said 95 percent of
factories were closed in the capital city
of Baku and other major cities.
. He said public transportation was
halted and newspapers were not deliv
ered. "Strikers are demanding full po
litical sovereignty for Azerbaijan, which
means they don't want to secede from
the Soviet Union, but ought to have the
right to make political decisions about
it$ territory," he said.
; An editor at the official Azerinform
nws agency, who refused to give his
name, said 95 percent "is a big over
statement." He said some factories were closed
and others were affected. "Some shops
are closed, but not ones selling food,"
he said. "Public transport is unreliable,
but Metro (subway) is working as
usual."
He said all oil refineries and power
plants were operating, and the railroad
was operating.
The People's Front is demanding
that the republic's representatives to
the national Congress of People's
Deputies be ousted. The nationalist
group claims its delegates to Congress
were chosen in fraudulent balloting and
have not acted in the best interests of
Azerbaijanis.
The activists also are demanding that
Azerbaijan reassert control over Nagorno-Karabakh,
a mountain enclave
that is 75 percent ethnic Armenian.
Neighboring Armenia wants to annex
the land.
The 18-month-old dispute over the
region, one of the most serious of
Moscow's spiraling ethnic problems,
has killed 100 people and forced hun
dreds of thousands to flee their homes.
In an effort to quell the violence, the
Kremlin extended direct rule over
Nagorno-Karabakh in January.
"Most Azerbaijanis have left Armenian-populated
areas," the Azerinform
editor said in a telephone interview.
"More and more Armenians are leav
ing their homes in the rest of the repub
lic, especially Baku."
In Moldavia, a southern republic
bordering Romania, labor protests
began two weeks ago during a debate
on the official language.
On Thursday, therepublic's Supreme
Soviet declared Moldavian the official
language, which appeased many na
tionalists but angered ethnic Russians
and other groups who make up more
than a third of Moldavia's 4.2 million
population.
"I do not think legislation passed in
Moldavia was a real compromise, as
local Soviets and work collectives are
denied the right to choose a working
language on their own," said Pyotr
Denisenko, a co-chairman of the strike
committee.
He said the strikers' ultimate de
mand is two official state languages,
Russian and Moldavian.
Denisenko, in a telephone interview,
said another 16 factories joined the
strike Tuesday, bringing the total
number of enterprises on strike to 21 8.
The Tass news agency said mem
bers of a national commission formed
last week to look at the dispute "called
on all citizens and independent organi
zations to refrain from rallies and other
mass actions and create the necessary
conditions forthe commission's work."
In Moscow, the Communist Party
Central Committee, the 251 -member
policy-making body, is to meet later
this month a new approach to relations
among the Soviet Union's more than
100 ethnic groups. The meeting has
been delayed several times, and a spe
cific date has not been set.
See tEie
preuieuj on
Friday
CHANGES
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BEGINNING FALL SEMESTER 1989
FOR STUDENT HEALTH FEE PAYING PATIENTS
CHARGES FOR LAB & X-RAY SERVICES:
$3.50 per LAB TEST
CO-PAYMENTS done at SHS
$10.00 per
X-RAY SERIES
Enrollment in supplemental BCBS Student Group
Health Insurance Plan covers co-payment charges
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BY CASH, CHECK or CREDIT CARD
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account
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payment of charges for a same-day visit
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For students interested in applying for
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study at Oxford University.
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Where: Murphy 100
When: 4:00 p.m
All students who plan to apply must attend this
meeting.
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flhMrvKsgp Our way
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