Pasadena Postal Workers, Others Protest Layoffs

About 75 demonstrators from US Postal Service workers unions and the Occupy Democracy Pasadena movement gathered Tuesday evening at the Mack Robinson Postal Processing Center on Orange Grove Boulevard to protest the laying off of workers from the Postal Service not just in Pasadena but across the country.

Protest organizers from the Processing Center were backed by members of the Occupy Democracy Pasadena group to show their support for the estimated 30,000 postal jobs nationwide which are being threatened by a financial crisis in the USPS itself.

“We have a post office to save in Pasadena, where potentially 300 people could be laid off and 30,000 nationwide (reducing OUR mail service). One source for this push to privatize our public commons, cut services, and lay off needed jobs has been the failure of the 1% to pay their fair share of taxes,” Occupy Democracy Pasadena organizer Patrick Briggs said in a statement regarding the purpose of the rally.

The protest criticizes the Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act of 2006 as the main cause of the financial crisis the USPS is going through. The Act requires the Postal Service to pre-fund health care benefits for future retirees, creating a financial vortex in the USPS budget leading to the financial crisis the organization is suffering through.

Occupy Democracy Pasadena organizers say they are inspired by the Occupy movement and believe that democracy only works when people participate in it, which is why people need to “occupy” the concept of democracy in order to expect change.