WASHINGTON D.C., DC — The top dog at the U.S. Postal Service is leaving months after widespread postal problems in Houston and around the country led to a Senate hearing in Washington, D.C.
KHOU 11 News was the first to report on mail delays affecting the Houston area in December 2023. We heard from customers who reported long delays for delivery of everything from life-saving medications to wedding gowns.
Editor’s note: The above video originally aired in April 2024.
In a statement released on Tuesday, Feb. 18, 2025, Postmaster General Louis DeJoy said his efforts to modernize the postal service would continue under new leadership.
“The Postal Service has ironclad plans to reduce costs by over $4 billion annually, raise revenue by over $5 billion and adjust its operating network to integrate the delivery of all mail and package categories, achieving service standards that make modern-day sense and compete in the marketplace,” DeJoy added.
He also praised USPS employees.
” … Despite being victimized by a legislative and regulatory business model that produced almost two decades of devastation to their organization and workplaces, they have persevered and embraced the changes we are making in order to better serve their fellow citizens,” DeJoy said.
During the 2024 hearing, USPS Inspector General Tammy Hull addressed the Houston issues. She read some of the findings of a 17-page audit conducted when postal inspectors toured the South Houston Local Processing Center in Missouri City in January 2024.
“The postal service had moved operations from another plant but staffing, equipment and logistics were not aligned with the new workload,” Hull said.
While on the hot seat for hours, DeJoy admitted that service has suffered in cities across the country because of operational changes implemented under his 10-year “Delivering for America” plan.
However, he ultimately defended the plan.
“We apologize to the constituents that have received that service,” DeJoy said. “In the long term, if we don’t make these changes that will be every day, everywhere, around the nation.”
DeJoy went on to blame management and employees for not embracing the changes.
“As we engage in this change, it is plant by plant, person by person, driver by driver that has to take on a new way of working, a new way of thinking,” DeJoy told the senators.
He took over as head of USPS in 2020.
The process to choose DeJoy’s replacement is now underway.
