What a Surprise! Gov't Employees at the GAO Think Postal Workers Should Be Able to Access USPS EV Chargers, But Not You
The United States Postal Service is planning on converting three-quarters of its fleet to electric vehicles. To charge all those EVs, the USPS is going to be buying 66,000 charging stations to install. That works to about two for each of their retail locations. [EDIT: A reader who works for the USPS points out that not every retail location has delivery trucks. Of the six USPS locations nearest to my home, four have fleets of trucks.] Three billion dollars for buying those EVs and chargers was allocated in the Biden administration’s Inflation Reduction Act. How reducing inflation by increasing government spending by $3 billion dollars sounds confusing to me but that’s a discussion for a different time.
Since the public is paying for those chargers, to their credit, three Democratic members of the House of Representatives, Stephen Lynch, D-Mass., Gerry Connolly, D-Va., and Jamie Raskin, D-Md., asked the GAO to examine the possibility of members of the public using those chargers for their personal needs.
After all, it might make sense to be able to top up your Tesla or Bolt while standing in line at the post office. One of the drawbacks to EVs is charging time but if you’re already going to be waiting, might as well get a charge, well, if you can.
You won’t be surprised that the government employees at the GAO concluded that letting the public access EV chargers that they paid for just wouldn’t be feasible. After all, you can’t just stop in the local office of a federal agency and ask them to use the photocopier. To make it clear that America is an oligarchy run not by billionaires or aristocrats but rather by millions of rather faceless government employees, not only did the GAO say that you shouldn’t be able to use USPS chargers but the GAO sort of chastised the USPS for not moving faster to give other their fellow government employees, postal workers, access to those same chargers. From Government Executive:
There are too many hurdles to allow the public to use the U.S. Postal Service’s forthcoming charging stations to juice up their own electric vehicles, according to the agency and a federal watchdog, even as the agency plans to add the capacity to tens of thousands of its facilities.
USPS should, however, create plans to allow its own workforce to charge their personal vehicles at agency facilities, the Government Accountability Office said, faulting the mailing agency for failing to take a more proactive approach toward offering that benefit. Postal officials said they are open to developing the initiative down the line…
Stoopid question: why will Substack read me ACF articles--in an oddly pleasant female voice, that’s great at 2x speed--but not yours? Just curious. BTW, if you ever get pushback on your (often detailed) explanations of all things Jewish, please ignore. I’m certain I’m not the only redneck goy who’s both educated and fascinated by your first-person facts and stories. Finally, I’m in rural Texas and we love our tiny Post Office and letter carrier. EVs? Not so much.
Letter Carrier here. There are many offices that are retail operations only, no carriers work out of them so your math is extremely flawed. In my office we have approximately 40 delivery vehicles operating. They are kept in a fenced in loading area at the back of the building. Allowing people to charge their cars there would cause serious safety and security concerns regarding mail access and carriers coming in and out throughout the day. Also keep in mind that the Post Office doesn't operate off tax dollars. We sell postage and have a P&L like any other business. It would be unreasonable to expect us just to provide free charging service.