Postal Changes Proposed in House

A House committee is weighing a bill that would offer charities some protection from big postage increases.

However, the bill would do nothing to change the increase that takes effect on January 10 (The Chronicle, July 16).

The bill was passed by the Postal Subcommittee of the House Committee on Government Reform and Oversight. Under the legislation, increases for non-profit groups would have to be tied largely to the rises in inflation, though the service would have some flexibility if it needed to charge more than that.

In addition, the bill would help keep non-profit costs under control by limiting the service’s estimates of how much it needs to increase rates in order to cover its costs in handling charity mail. The Postal Service would not be able to estimate that it cost more to handle non-profit mail than commercial mail. Handling costs were the focus of a bitter dispute in the most recent rate decision, when charities argued that the Postal Service overestimated non-profit mail costs — and handed them a much larger percentage increase than it handed commercial mailers.

No further action on the measure is expected until January.