ATLANTA – The U.S. postmaster general would be subject to term limits and Senate confirmation under legislation introduced Wednesday by Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga.
Ossoff has been highly critical of Postmaster General Louis DeJoy since reports surfaced earlier this year of months-long delays in delivering mail processed at a new regional distribution center in Fulton County.
The senator said during a committee hearing in April that only 36% of inbound mail processed at the center was being delivered on time, holding up prescriptions, delaying rent and mortgage payments, and preventing businesses from being able to ship products or receive supplies in a timely manner.
“What we have seen in the state of Georgia in the last year has been abysmal performance,” Ossoff said Wednesday. “We must hold the postmaster general accountable.”
The Postmaster General Reform Act would limit those who serve in that office to two consecutive five-year terms. The Senate would hold confirmation hearings on the president’s nominee for postmaster general both before his or her first term and between their first and second terms.
Postmaster general was a Cabinet position nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate until 1971, when the U.S. Postal Service was converted into an independent agency. Since then, the postmaster general has been selected by the agency’s Board of Governors.
But Ossoff said the office is too important to leave to unelected officials.
“This is a job that so impacts our day-to-day lives the elected representatives of the people need the opportunity to ask questions,” he said. “There needs to be a real job interview.”
DeJoy testified at the April hearing that the delays in mail processing and delivery in Georgia were the result of problems encountered during the rollout last winter of a restructuring plan aimed at making the postal service economically self-sufficient.
Shortly after the hearing, DeJoy put the restructuring plan on hold to give the postal service time to figure out what went wrong and how to fix it.
He also announced specific solutions for the Fulton County center in Palmetto, including bringing in more than 100 personnel from other centers and revising transportation schedules between the Palmetto facility and other local mail processing centers.
In June, DeJoy reported improvements in service, but Georgians have continued to complain about delays sending and receiving mail.