TABLE #5 PLEASE NOTE: THESE FIGURES ARE THOSE PROVIDED BY THE MR. CHAIRMAN AND MEMBERS OF THE SUBCOMMITTEE, I AGAIN WANT TO EXPRESS MY GRATITUDE FOR THE OPPORTUNITY TO TESTIFY BEFORE YOU TODAY. I ALSO WANT YOU TO KNOW HOW MUCH I APPRECIATE THE SUPPORT AND ADVICE YOU HAVE GIVEN ME AS YOUR POSTMASTER. I HOPE THAT I MAY CONTINUE TO COUNT ON YOUR GUIDANCE IN THE FUTURE. WITH YOUR HELP, I FEEL THAT WE HAVE MADE THE HOUSE POST OFFICE, THE MOST EFFICIENT ORGANIZATION OF ITS KIND IN THE NATIONAL GOVERNMENT. AGAIN, THANK YOU FOR PROVIDING ME WITH THIS OPPORTUNITY TO PRESENT THE BUDGET FOR THE HOUSE. POST OFFICE FOR FISCAL YEAR 1980. STATEMENT SUMMARIZED Mr. ROTA. With the committee's permission, may I just follow my statement in outline? Mr. BENJAMIN. Fine. Mr. ROTA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee: The total appropriations requested by the House Post Office for fiscal year 1980 is $1,284,700. This is an increase of $107,600 over last year. This increase is primarily the result of mandatory cost of living and longevity increases, and 5 additional employees. Due to the substantial increase in the volume of mail last year combined with the expanded services to the House Office Building Annex, it was necessary during 1978 to request 5 additional employees. As you may recall, the 5-employee addition we made last year was the first increase in the number of mail handlers since I became Postmaster. The House Post Office has steadily increased the amount of mail processed-estimated to have tripled in volume since 1972-without any additions to the staff. The volume of mail has increased over 300 percent in 6 years, with only a 9 percent increase in personnel which was requested last year. In addition to increasing the amount of mail processed by each House Post Office employee, we have been able to expand and improve the services offered to the members and will continue to do so. STATISTICAL TABLES In order to evaluate the performance of the House Post Office, we have compiled statistics which are set forth in seven tables. Table No. 1 demonstrates the volume of mail being processed by the House Post Office. Table 1 reflects letter mail, what we call a No. 10 letter envelope, received only from the Postal Service. It is estimated that these figures represent less than half of the total amount of mail received. In addition to the mail received through the U.S. Postal Service, we receive a large volume directly from private organizations. I should note that lobbying groups or other large organizations which have mass mailings that they want members to receive on any one particular day, may bring mail in by the thousands or even a half million pieces directly to the House Post Office and we deliver this. For instance, during the consideration of the situs picketing bill, 55,000 pieces of mail were received by the Speaker in less than 2 hours. Various State governments, Federal agencies, and departments also deliver mail in bulk to the House Post Office. We also accept bulk delivery of newspapers. I have had the cooperation of the large newspapers in this regard. Rather than sending in newspapers addressed separately, we have been able to have them sent to the Postmaster in one unit, and by doing this we have been able to get the newspapers to the members immediately. They will airlift them to us and then deliver to the Postmaster. We have a list and deliver them as soon as they are received rather than having you receive one newspaper today at 9 o'clock and then having the chairman receive the same newspaper tomorrow. This way we can control the newspapers and have them delivered the same day. Mr. MICHEL. That doesn't include the local papers, however. Mr. ROTA. Yes, sir. We have been able to work it out with the Post. Mr. MICHEL. We are having a problem of ours being stolen every morning. Mr. ROTA. You have? Mr. MICHEL. Yes. Mr. ROTA. How do you receive it? Mr. MICHEL. Openly. Mr. BENJAMIN. Likewise. Mr. MICHEL. Maybe it is too much to ask to put it into the slot, because I know that takes all that additional time. Mr. ROTA. No. Mr. MICHEL. I was wondering how we could do that. Mr. MICHEL. Admittedly our office is just opposite the elevator, so the paper could easily be taken. [Discussion off the record.] Mr. ROTA. With further reference to the mail we deliver which is not reflected in the tables presented today, we have the "Dear Colleague" letters, inside mail, daily legislative calendars, Congressional Records, metropolitan area telephone books and congressional telephone books, correspondence from the Library of Congress, White House mailings plus many other types of mail that are delivered but are not reflected in the the US Postal Service fig ures. In total, it is estimated that the House Post Office delivers well in excess of 100 million pieces of mail per year. I will ask unanimous consent to correct Table 1. These figures reflect the incoming letter mail; this is your only mail from constituents. That is a small portion of the total mail handled. Table No. 1 also compares our staff over the past 6 years as well as the number of stops served and the volume of mail handled. You can see that mail volume and number of stops served have continued to increase over the years. In 1973 we served only 630 stops-that would be your offices and other committees and subcommitteesand the volume of letter mail was 20,599,253. In 1978 we have a total of 87 employees processing 28,017,000 pieces of mail to 1,016 stops. This is 386 additional stops being served with a greatly increased volume of mail-all being handled by our employees |