[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 19 (Wednesday, January 31, 2007)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1397-S1398]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




         HONORING GEORGE OMAS, CHAIRMAN, POSTAL RATE COMMISSION

  Mr. LOTT. Mr. President. I rise to mark the retirement from Federal 
service, of a loyal friend and Mississippian, and a fine public 
servant, George Omas.

[[Page S1398]]

  Word has reached me that George will soon be leaving the Postal Rate 
Commission, where he has been serving as Chairman since November 2001. 
His leadership at the helm of that agency, which oversees the revenues 
and expenses of the U.S. Postal Service and recommends the appropriate 
postage rates, has done much to restore financial confidence in the 
Postal Service.
  September 11 and the accompanying anthrax attacks rocked our U.S. 
Postal Service with unplanned for expenses to such a degree that an 
increase in rates were badly needed to offset those expenses without 
reducing services to the American people. When the Postal Service made 
their request to the commission on September 24, 2001, George made 
history by thinking truly ``outside the box'' and proposed something 
never done before but was highly needed at the time: a ``settlement 
agreement'' of a major rate case. No small task as it required the 
Postal Service, the Postal Rate Commission and almost 100 interested 
parties and representatives of the mailing industry to agree to forgo 
lengthy litigation of the pending case and meet and work out 
differences together.
  He was told it was ``impossible'' there was too much money at stake 
for parties to waive a good portion of their due process rights to 
achieve such an agreement. But, he felt strongly that September 11 was 
an extraordinary event and it called for extraordinary thinking on 
everyone's part, so on the first day of the hearings in that case after 
he had read his opening statement, he added these remarks:

       I have often heard it said that there could never be a 
     settlement in an omnibus rate case. There are too many 
     conflicting interests, and too much money is at stake. But it 
     seems to me that if there was ever a time when `business as 
     usual' was not an attractive course of action, and when 
     cooperative efforts to promptly resolve issues through 
     settlement might be the right course of action, that time is 
     now.

  To everyone's surprise, even their own, the parties responded. In 
approximately two and a half months the many diverse interests that 
frequently bitterly contest multiple issues in postal rate cases were 
able to negotiate, revise, and submit a stipulation and agreement as a 
proposed settlement. Instead of the normal 10 months, the entire case 
was initiated, negotiated and agreed to within 6 months.
  In the 2002 Annual Report of the Postal Service, the Postmaster 
General and the Chairman of the Board of Governors explained the effect 
of those momentous remarks:

       And, following a suggestion by the chairman of the Postal 
     Rate Commission, we approached our major stakeholders and 
     took a bold step that enabled us to implement new postage 
     rates in June, 2002, rather than in the fall. This gained us 
     an additional $1 billion in revenue. As a result, and despite 
     the impacts of the recession and the terror attacks, we were 
     able to close the year with a loss that was almost $700 
     million below original projections and half of last year's. 
     None of the $762 million the Administration and Congress 
     generously appropriated to the Postal Service to protect the 
     security of the mail was used for operations.

  George took the success of that effort and encouraged the Postal 
Service to look beyond the historical friction existing at their two 
agencies and focus on new ways to help the Postal Service continue to 
be successful. The Postal Service initiated a number of so-called 
negotiated service agreements and the commission and interested parties 
processed such agreements that brought in new volumes of mail and 
additional revenues to the Postal Service thus, extending the time 
needed between rate increases.
  George has been a very successful chairman at the commission and I 
want to note his departure. I hope the legacy he leaves behind in the 
postal community and indeed, throughout government, is one of 
innovative thinking and the knowledge that working together can solve 
seemingly insurmountable problems.
  So now that I have told you about George and the good things he has 
done, as a good Senator, I want to take credit for his good work by 
saying that I have known George since our days together at The 
University of Mississippi and that he served on my staff at various 
times in my career, including my time on the former House Committee on 
Post Office and Civil Service. When President Clinton nominated George 
as Postal Rate Commissioner in 1997, I was very pleased to introduce 
him at his confirmation hearings and give him my support. Needless to 
say, I was even more pleased when President Bush designated George as 
chairman of the commission in 2001.
  George comes from good folks; his sister and her husband Bernadine 
and Ralph Marchitto, his niece Debra Lynn Wren, her husband John and 
George's grand niece Rebecca Elizabeth Wren still reside in the Biloxi 
area. Almost everyone who lived in Biloxi in the 1950s to the 1980s 
knew his parents, Violet and Pete Omas.
  I will add that while George may be leaving the Postal Rate 
Commission, I don't believe he will going far, he has too much left to 
offer and I look forward to continuing to follow his future successes.

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