The USPS (US Postal Service) Workers Rank-and-File Committee is holding an online meeting this Sunday at 3 p.m. EDT, “For a rank-and-file investigation into the extreme heat deaths of two USPS workers!” Register for the event here (bit.ly/USPSRFC).

The tragic deaths this month of Dan Workman in Colorado and Jacob Taylor in Dallas are part of an appalling routine: as temperatures rise, so too do reports of workers collapsing, suffering heat stroke and dying on the job.

Workers must not allow management and the union bureaucrats to sweep their deaths under the rug! The USPS Workers Rank-and-File Committee is preparing an investigation into the circumstances behind these terrible tragedies, including:

• the lack of air conditioning or other basic safety measures for extreme heat;
• management policies, including electronic surveillance which lead to dangerous overwork;
• understaffing and route changes under the Delivering for America restructuring program;
• the inaction and even complicity of union bureaucrats

The investigation will show how the lives of postal workers and other delivery workers are being sacrificed for the sake of profit. This is all the more crucial given the threat to privatize USPS under Trump and incoming Postmaster General, David Steiner.

Rather than organizing an all-out fight to save the post office as a public service, the postal unions are pushing through contracts which clear the deck for these plans. This includes a National Assocation of Letter Carriers (NALC) contract for city carriers imposed through binding arbitration (after workers had rejected it by 70 percent), and a contract being voted on now for clerks in the American Postal Workers Union (APWU) for which the language has not even been finalized.

The investigation will be a critical element in building an independent movement from below to fight for workers’ power. The goal is to empower rank-and-file committees to take control of safety conditions and line speed, abolish toothless joint labor-management safety committees and end the dictatorship of production for profit.

Join the USPS Workers Rank-and-File Committee this Sunday at 3 p.m. Eastern time for a meeting to launch this campaign. Register for the event, send in your testimony and make the decision to join the USPSRFC!