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Stockton Plant On Postal Service's List Of Closures

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- The U.S. Postal Service's plan to cut costs could lead to the closure of more than a dozen mail processing facilities employing hundreds of workers in California, including one in Stockton.

The financially troubled agency announced Thursday it may close more than 250 mail processing facilities, or more than half of the service's processing centers nationwide.

The Postal Service expects the closures, as well as reduced service standards for first-class mail, could save as much as $3 billion annually but also would affect 35,000 workers across the country.

Fourteen of the facilities are in California, including in Stockton, Burlingame, Petaluma, Eureka and Redding that together employ more than 1,000 people.

All 1,014 employees at the Northern California processing centers may be able to keep their jobs, but some may be asked to transfer elsewhere in the same district, said Gus Ruiz, a Postal Service spokesman.

"We have a number of vacancies that we held open knowing we'd face this one day," Ruiz told the San Francisco Chronicle. "We feel confident that we'll find employment for all our employees."

In Southern and Central California, the agency was considering closing facilities in Bakersfield, Los Angeles, City of Industry, Long Beach, San Diego, Modesto, Pasadena, San Bernardino and Van Nuys.

The agency plans to reduce current delivery standards for first-class mail, which is currently supposed to be delivered in one to three days, depending on how far it has to go. That will be changed to two to three days, meaning mailers could no longer expect next-day delivery in their local community.

The agency is also seeking additional savings through requests that Congress allow the post office to eliminate mail delivery on Saturdays and change or eliminate an annual $5.5 billion payment the post office is required to make into a fund to cover future retiree medical benefits.

(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

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