Women's Information Network
Against Breast Cancer

Please submit only once, then click "reload page" to see the updated board. Thank you.

Reload Page Post Message Message Board Search FAQ

Posted by Betsy Mullen on 3/16/2001 from 205.188.195.201:

Dear Friends and Colleagues:

We need your immediate help and support. We have included below, a letter that we need to submit to the United States Postal Service (USPS) by 12:00 pm Eastern Standard Time, this coming Monday, March 19, 2001, to urge the continuation of the Breast Cancer Research Stamp.

For ease of administration, we are hoping that you will sign on to the letter on this message by replying to this message by e-mailing me at betsy@winabc.org and stating that you are signing on to our letter, also stating your name, organization and title (title, if relevant) as well as your city and state. We will then compile a list of all supporters and attach the list to the letter we submit to the US Postal Service:

This is the information we need sent back in reply to this message (Please feel free to copy and paste the text below with your response):

____________________________________________________________

Yes, I am signing on to your Letter of Response to the Proposed USPS Rules.

Name:

Organization:

Title:

City:

State:

____________________________________________________________
We encourage you to forward this e-mail to as many individuals and organizations as possible, but ask that all replies with peoples' names, organizations and titles be sent directly to this e-mail address (winabc@aol.com) for ease of coordination and administration, especially since we are in a 24-hour deadline period. We welcome and encourage a diverse group of supporters.

It is important to note that lending support to our position in the continuation of the issuance of the Breast Cancer Research Stamp as we state in our response to the USPS Proposed Rules, will establish an important precedent and policy that will also serve to help ensure that other cause-related fund raising stamps will have longevity beyond the proposed two-year period for any and all new semipostal (fundraising) stamps.

Thank you in advance for your time, consideration, support and quick action on this important matter.


My sincerest thanks and warmest regards,
Betsy


BACKGROUND

Thanks to your support last summer, we were able to secure legislation to reauthorize the Breast Cancer Research Stamp for an additional two-years with the possibility under the auspices of the The Semipostal Authorization Act, for the United States Postal Service to continue the Breast Cancer Research Stamp far beyond the two-year period. The Semipostal Authorization Act, Pub. Law No. 106-253, 114 Stat. 634 (2000), authorizes the Postal Service to establish a ten-year program to sell semipostal (fundraising) stamps.

Unfortunately, and in spite of assurances to the contrary by high-level USPS officials and contrary to the intent of the Semipostal Authorization Act legislation and law, the proposed rules that will govern the ten-year program call for the termination of the Breast Cancer Research Stamp at the end of the two-year period on July 29, 2002. Further, the rules propose that the USPS will issue only one semipostal stamp every two years and once a cause has been selected for a semipostal stamp, that same cause can never benefit from a semipostal stamp in the future.


Semipostal Stamp Program Proposed Rule

"Semipostal Stamp Program
AGENCY: Postal Service.
ACTION: Proposed rule.
SUMMARY: This proposed rule would create implementation regulations for the Semipostal Authorization Act, which authorizes the Postal Service to issue and sell semipostal postage stamps. Semipostal stamps are intended to raise funds for causes determined by the Postal Service to be in the public interest and appropriate. The proposed regulations relate to the selection procedures for causes and recipient executive agencies, the offices and authorities responsible for making decisions related to causes and recipient executive agencies, the criteria to be applied in evaluating proposals for causes and recipient executive agencies, sales limitations, the calculation of amounts to be transferred to executive agencies, and the determination of costs to be offset from differential revenue."*

*Source: http://new.usps.com/cgi-bin/uspsbv/scripts/content.jsp?B=null&D=27228


Comments must be received on or before this coming Monday, March 19, 2001. We will need to submit our letter, with your name, title and that of your organization by 12:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time to ensure that our letter is recorded properly and on deadline.

You can access the full text of the proposed rules via the following web address:

http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=2001_register&docid=01-3845-filed.pdf


Our Letter of Response to the Proposed Rules:


Manager
Stamp Services
ATTN: Semipostal Proposed Rules
475 L’Enfant Plaza SW
Room 5670
Washington, DC 20260-2435


To whom it may concern:


We are writing in response to the proposed rule published on February 15, 2001 in the Federal Register to guide implementation of the Semipostal Authorization Act. We thank the United States Postal Service for its diligent work in drafting a thoughtful and comprehensive implementation plan. Nonetheless, we take issue with Sections 551.5(b) and (c), which require the United States Postal Service to offer "only one semipostal stamp for sale at any given time," and limit the length of sale to a two year-period "as determined by the office of Stamp Services."

It is our position that a successful semipostal should be permitted to remain on the market as long as the American public continues to support it. No semipostal should be eliminated when sales are robust and it has yet to achieve its greatest potential. This policy would be consistent with Section 551.5(d) of the proposed rulemaking, which permits the withdrawal of a semipostal before the two-year period expires if sales or revenue statistics and projections are lower than expected. Just as less successful semipostals may be taken off the market prematurely, those stamps that are achieving their mission of raising funds and increasing awareness of a particular cause should not be curtailed. We recommend the establishment of a minimum acceptable level of sales, as determined by the United States Postal Service, to guide the continued production of a semipostal in order to support consumer demand.

We also emphasize that permitting a semipostal to continue outside an initial two-year window should not preclude additional semipostals from being sold simultaneously. The United States Postal Service’s experience with commemorative stamps demonstrates that several diverse "issue" stamps can be placed on the market at the same time to the detriment of none. As the semipostal program is launched, we urge the United States Postal Service to follow its own precedent for commemoratives.

Rather than imposing an arbitrary two-year limit, we recommend relying on the marketplace to determine the life of a stamp. If people are willing to spend more than the value of a postage stamp so that they can contribute towards one or more worthwhile initiatives, the United States Postal Service should not ignore its ability to help them do so. Moreover, our fundraising experience has taught us that people enjoy donating to more than one cause at any given time. The market can sustain more than one semipostal just as it can sustain innumerable charities and causes.

Considerations of cost also dictate that semipostal sales should continue as long as they are successful. Not only are the bulk of costs for the issuance of any stamp incurred disproportionately at its inception, but additional costs are associated with the withdrawal of a stamp from the market and related destruction of unsold stamps (See Sections 551.8 (g)(6) and (7)). Ongoing stamp sales should continue as long as the semipostal can sustain itself, permitting the greatest opportunity to recoup start-up costs and avoid unnecessary expenses involved with prematurely ending sales.

The pioneer semipostal, the Breast Cancer Research Stamp, has been a proven success. Over 279.4 million Breast Cancer Research Stamps have been sold, raising $111.8 million in revenues and $19.5 million for research at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Department of Defense (DoD). A significant percentage of these sales – approximately $4.5 million – has been achieved since July of 2000, when the initial two-year sales period was set to expire. As other important causes, such as (e.g., Domestic violence, heart disease, the environment, and diabetes), are permitted a similar opportunity to raise needed funding and increase awareness, we urge the United States Postal Service to establish regulations that will enable all of them to reach their potential and continue as long as the American people choose to support them.


Thank you very much for your consideration.


Sincerely,






Elizabeth ("Betsy") Mullen
Founder, President/CEO
WIN Against Breast Cancer
Main Office:
536 S. Second Avenue, Suite K
Covina, California 91723
Phone: 626-332-2255 Fax: 626-332-2585
San Diego Office: Telephone: (619) 284-4900
Web Site: www.winabc.org

Follow Ups:

Post a Followup

[ Followups ] [ Post Followup ]

Please submit only once, then click "reload page" to see the updated board. Thank you.

Reload Page Post Message Message Board Search FAQ

HOME

PHOTOS

SITE MAP

GLOSSARY OF TERMS

SEARCH