KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — In October, the U.S. Postal Service was considering changes including relocating some operations at a West Knoxville center to Louisville, Kentucky. They were conducting a review process on possible changes.
Lawmakers across East Tennessee including Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Knoxville), Rep. Diana Harshbarger (R-Tri Cities) and Rep. Chuck Fleischmann (R-Chattanooga) started asking questions about the future of the centers in Knoxville, Chattanooga and Johnson City.
On Jan. 9, USPS sent a letter to the three representatives, saying the review process would not close any centers or impact career employees.
"I've grown very dissatisfied with their lackluster responses and timing," Burchett said. "We still don't know if, how this is going to affect the seasonal workers and or the workers in general"
The report does say USPS will modernize its delivery network and the processes behind how workers deliver mail.
"And this so-called efficiencies that they're claiming they're trying to address," he said. "I don't know, they're gonna go automation. They do automation, how much is that going to cost? And is that in effect, going to clear up some of the delays or further delay? What about very important products being mailed?"
The letter lists some questions from lawmakers, but Burchett said it doesn't answer all of them.
"I just want to know what their real intent is, and why they left some of the things out of the letter that we had asked about — mainly employment of our constituents," he said.
Burchett sits on the House Oversight and Accountability Committee, which is responsible for overseeing USPS.
"They say that they, in fact, would have a phone call with us, which I thought was really big of them. I say that tongue in cheek," Burchett said. "I'm going to be ready on that phone call. I have some pretty tough questions."
Burchett said Wednesday he's supposed to get a call from USPS next week. He said if he doesn't get the answers he's looking for, he'll go to the chairman of the committee.
"I would not hesitate to talk to Chairman Comer and bring them before our committee," Burchett said. "So I think it's a bipartisan issue, and we need to address it."