Postal Waste or Postal Perk?

April 30, 2011-This morning on my walk through Chinatown, we (today I was accompanied by two fellow senior citizen walkers) encounter a unusual situation...a postal delivery vehicle parked in the 1000 block of Stockton Street---right in the middle of Chinatown.

Why is that strange? Because the time was 8:30 a.m., my companions asked me why is that strange. I replied when have you ever seen a mail person (cannot use mailman, since it can be a mail woman too)  that early in Chinatown on a Saturday. One of my companion said the mail person could be delivering a "Special Delivery." I replied the Postal Service replaced that service awhile back with something call "Express Mail"! As I taking the picture, I noticed the gentleman with his back toward us in brown jacket and pants was getting into the postal vehicle. He dropped something inside the vehicle and came back between the vehicle to jaywalk across Stockton Street. It was an Oriental man but not dressed in the usual mail person uniform. We watched as the person walked into a produce store along Stockton Street. My other elder statesman companion waited until the gentleman walked by us and told me that he have seen this person before on a previous Saturday morning shopping along Jackson Street, but he was driving a white postal van that day. The wizard was very intrigue with these developments.

Why? I been reading news articles about how the Postal Service must downsize because of less mail volumes and on the brink of not having enough revenue to continue operation. I sense there were something amiss this morning with the postal employee at Chinatown. I have some understanding of how the post office operate in San Francisco and from Jackson Street to Fisherman's Wharf the zone belongs to my area post office. I have many occasion chatted with older mailmen in my area and I got to know that majority of the mail person who works around Chinatown have walking routes, because as they claims it's postal nightmares---no parking, jammed sidewalks & congested traffic! I have seen several occasions mail person in full uniform parking their postal vehicle to pickup trays of prepared foods like for a postal party  on Saturday morning. I might consider it more of a "postal perk," since the postal vehicle can easily park anywhere in Chinatown, get out and load the foods and off he/she goes. This gentleman might be better label as "postal waste," since he was using the postal service for personal gains.

I wanted to get an expert opinion, therefore I got back home and called an old friend whom had a son working in postal management somewhere in the Bay Area. I was able to describe what happened this morning to my friend's son; I know newer mail person do not get uniform right away and he corrected me by saying newer employee would not go shopping while delivering the mails; because they would be terminated at the end of the day. He said it could be either a clerk or supervisor making a "Express Mail" delivery that have a guarantee delivery standard of 11:30 a.m. that day and asked if I noticed the person carrying some kind of scanning device. I told him the person was not carrying any device and the vehicle  was clean of any mail delivery material except one pink grocery bag,

He claims I could be just right---a postal employee using the postal vehicle to easily shop at Chinatown. He told me I can file a complaint with the post office through their 1-800 number. I asked him would that gentleman get fired? He laughed and said the most the person might get is either a lecture to next time park in less visible area or worst a letter in his file for bad judgement. I said what about wasting taxpayer money! He said the post office is self-sufficient and is not supported by any tax-payer money. He claimed that the postal service would had made a profit the last few years if it was not for Congress requiring them to prefund future retiree's health benefits. I replied if the postal service wanted to be self-sufficient, therefore they should be required to paid all present and future obligations. The problem of not prefunding some benefits would lead to yearly postal rate increase or finally a "real" government bailout.



My old friend called me back an hour later and told his son that I read too much and during our ancient schooldays I major in American history, political science and economic. His son told him thanks God I did not run for public office! Would never happen---already sold my soul long ago!