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in these times of losing $16 billion per year. the Postal Service in 2006 has led USPS to Its been made clear that Congress does make such a discriminatory choice. NNA not provide tax money to the Postal Service. disagrees with both the policy decision and It does however still oversee the agency. Since the legal reasoning behind it. We hope to still the government is currently operating on tem- work with the Postal Service on a plan to porary spending rather than an appropriations ensure timely delivery of newspapers. The unfair requirebill, the USPS claims it ments hes speaking of can make this change is the dirty little secret without Congressional that is leading to the approval. continual demise of Time will tell. None the USPS the preof this will occur withfunding of healthcare out deep discussion benefits for future reand blow back due to tirees. the fact that the deciTake it from U.S. Consion seemed to hit our By Derek Sawvell gressman Dave Loebdoorsteps (literally) on sack, our representative the front pages of our newspapers the same products that will be here in Cedar and Muscatine counties, who was quoted in the Des Moines Register saying affected by the move. There are 270 newspapers in Iowa and the following: By requiring the Postal Service many, if not all, will feel the effects. I think to pre-fund retirement health benefits to the of our snow birds and folks who live in other tune of (more than) $50 billion over 10 years, states, that, while our paper is dated for Thurs- which no other agency or business has to do, days, normally get their paper on Fridays or Congress is tying their hands. Saturdays. It may be Monday now You dont have to spend much time reading I think of our Eastern Iowa Bizzzy Bee about recent USPS losses before you stumble publication, included in the North Scott Press, upon this fact. Tough to call it a secret. Well which would be affected. continue to watch what the future holds, but National Newspaper Association President until Congress revamps the USPS, I fear the Merle Baranczyk issued the following state- waters will remain turbulent for quite some ment, The Postal Services announcement time. today that it intends to maintain Saturday *** delivery of packages but abandon delivery Annual INA conventionI traveled to Des of newspapers is an indication the service Moines last week for the annual Iowa Newsis moving further and further away from the paper Association convention and trade show. universal service the American public expects. For the third straight year, the AN was able to This unfortunate decision sees packages as return with hardware. profitable but forgets the importance of money The Advocate News won a first place award in the mail for small businesses and thousands in the Best Special Section Advertising of American communities who depend upon category for our Newspapers in Education local newspaper delivery on Saturdays. The presentation where we have Durant, Bennett National Newspaper Association has a long and Wilton area sixth graders design ads for record of supporting six day delivery. It is local businesses. regrettable the inaction of Congress to deal This is a project that takes weeks of preparawith the unfair requirements it imposed upon tion, presentations, collection, distribution and
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selection prior to the final, finished product. Our staff does a wonderful job with it year in and year out. The AN also won third place in the Coverage of Government and Politics category, receiving the following comments from judges (members of the South Dakota Newspaper Association): Solid entry. Good coverage of school issue. The category takes a lot of leg work because 10 work samples have to be submitted. In our class Class III Weeklies (the largest Iowa weekly class of papers with more than 2,200 circulation) its wonderful to be in the running for such a prestigious award. I received the Jay P. Wagner prize for young journalists (see story on page 2). There were three statewide winners. One of the criteria was that you couldnt be older than 30 on Dec. 31. I turned 30 in October so based on this criteria, as of this time next year I will be officially old. However on a serious note, it was a humbling experience to receive such an award from the INA. I feel honored to have the responsibility of connecting with all of you in these wonderful communities. Simply stated, we wont get complacent. Well continue to do our best and work hard for our great cities and their people.