536 Chattanooga USPS Employees Seek New Jobs

The U.S. Postal Service will shutdown the Chattanooga Remote Encoding Center (REC) in April 2009, leaving 536 people to seek other jobs.

Accroding to a USPS news release, "The 145 career postal employees at the Chattanooga REC will be reassigned to other postal positions in accordance with employee union collective bargaining agreements. The 391 parttime temporary employees will receive outplacement counseling to help them find new employment."

The USPS says the shutdown is part of a nationwide consolidation plan due to "technology enhancements."One of those losing out is Lindy Boid. Encoding mail has been her career for 11 years.

"Shocked we knew it was coming but we didn't know it was coming today so its bad news," says Boid.

Bad news that's been coming since the plant started. In 1994, the Postal Service set up 55 of these temporary mail encoding plants to make it easier to read and process handwritten mail.

Computers took pictures of the mail, and employees at the encoding center read and typed the address so it was delivered to the right place.

But now, computers can do almost all of it on their own, reducing the number of plants down to 5.

"More and more REC centers have been closing down so we are kind of a victim. We are a victim of the technology of the U.S Postal Service," says John Rollins, a temporary employee.

"Losing a job will always be difficult," says Shae Allen. Allen is one of 391 temporary employees who will be out of work in April.

While 145 career employees like, Lindy Boid will have the option to transfer to one of the 5 plants that will be left. But Boid says many of those plants are far away, and doubts many career employees can afford to move.

"Its devastating to the community. I mean it employs several hundred people so the timing couldn't be worse because the economy is so bad," says Boid.

Postal Service spokesperson says this decision was also based on factors like operating and facility costs.

Closing this plant will not affect workers or service from the Eastgate Post Office. People can still go there to deliver or pick up mail.

USPS NEWS RELEASE

CHATTANOOGA, TN) - The U.S. Postal Service today announced that the Chattanooga Remote Encoding Center (REC) will be closed as part of the next phase of a nationwide consolidation plan. The facility, located at 911 Eastgate Loop, will close in April, 2009.

"The Remote Encoding Centers were designed as a temporary solution to automate and expedite the processing of handwritten and poorly printed addresses," said Carolyn Chambers, District Manager for the U.S. Postal Service's Tennessee District. "The plan from the start was to downsize the REC operation as technology enhancements enabled us to automate more mail."

In 1994 when the Chattanooga REC and 54 others were established, postal computerized sorting equipment could only read two percent of addresses on handwritten envelopes. Since that time, with new technology improvements, postal computers are currently able to read and process 95 percent of the mail electronically.

Chambers said the decision about which facilities to close was based on a variety of business factors, including operating costs, facility costs, lease expiration dates and the ability of other RECs to absorb the workload. This closing, and the previous closings since the consolidation process began in 1999, means that the number of RECs will decline to five.

The Postal Service is providing the REC employees with as much advance notice of the closings as possible. The 145 career postal employees at the Chattanooga REC will be reassigned to other postal positions in accordance with employee union collective bargaining agreements. The 391 parttime temporary employees will receive outplacement counseling to help them find new employment.

The remote encoding process involves transmitting electronic images of handwritten mail from mail processing plants to RECs where operators view them on computer screens and key in address information. This information is transmitted back to the postal processing plant where a barcode corresponding to the address is printed on the envelope so that it can be processed on automated equipment. With ever-increasing improvements in optical character recognition technology, the volume of images sent to RECs has diminished significantly and the Postal Service has gradually consolidated them. As technology evolves, the Postal Service will continue to look for opportunities to reduce operating costs and these opportunities will likely include additional REC consolidations in coming
years.