Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act
Latest action. Became public lawWhat a bill becomes when enacted, numbered by Congress and order of enactment: Public Law 119-4 is the 4th law of the 119th Congress.Read the full definition (opens a new tab) No: 109-435.
Postal Accountability and Enhancement Act - Title I: Definitions; Postal Services - (Sec. 101) Amends federal law provisions concerning the Postal Service to add definitions, including the terms postal service, competitive product, market-dominant product, and rates.
(Sec. 102) Removes provisions empowering the Postal Service to provide nonpostal services, except that the Postal Service may provide nonpostal services which were offered as of January 1, 2006, subject to a specified review by the Postal Regulatory Commission (PRC) (formerly the Postal Rate Commission, see section 601).
Requires the PRC to review each nonpostal service offered by the Postal Service and determine whether that service shall continue and, if so, to designate whether the service shall be regulated as a market-dominant, competitive, or experimental product.
Title II: Modern Rate Regulation - (Sec. 201) Directs the PRC to establish a modern system for regulating rates and classes for market-dominant products (all first-class mail, parcels, and cards, periodicals, standard mail, single-piece parcel post, media mail, bound printed matter, library mail, special services, and single-piece international mail). Requires the system to, among other things: (1) include an annual limitation on the percentage changes in rates; and (2) require the Postal Service to provide public notice, and the PRC to provide an opportunity for review of, rate adjustments at least 45 days before implementation. Requires the PRC, as part of the regulations, to establish rules for workshare discounts (discounts provided to mailers for presorting, barcoding, etc.) to ensure that such discounts do not exceed the cost that the Postal Service avoids as a result of workshare activity (with exceptions). Requires the Postal Service to report to the PRC whenever it establishes a workshare discount rate.
(Sec. 202) Directs the Postal Service Board of Governors to establish rates and classes for products in the competitive category of mail (priority and expedited mail, bulk parcel post and bulk international mail, and mailgrams).
Directs the PRC to promulgate (and from time to time revise) regulations to: (1) prohibit the subsidization of competitive products by market-dominant products; (2) ensure that each competitive product covers its attributable costs; and (3) ensure that all competitive products collectively cover what the Commission determines to be an appropriate share of Postal Service institutional costs.
The summary continues for 50 more paragraphs. Read it in full on Congress.gov
Written by analysts at the Congressional Research Service and published on Congress.gov, not by Civibrief. Summarized at the "Public Law" stage on December 20, 2006. It describes the bill, it is not the legal text.
Where is it in the process, and what happens next?
This bill has been enacted. It is law.
The record's latest action, on December 20, 2006: Became Public Law No: 109-435.
Has anyone actually voted on it?
No. No roll call in this Congress cites this measure. That is the ordinary outcome: most measures never reach a recorded floor vote, and a committee ends most of them simply by not acting.
A vote is not the only thing that happens to a measure. Hearings, markups, and referrals are all recorded actions, and none of them is a vote of the full chamber.
Who is behind it?
THOMAS DAVIS (R-VA) introduced it on December 7, 2006, and 3 members have since signed on as cosponsors.
They come from both major parties: 2 Democrats, 1 Republican.
Cosponsoring is a formal signature on the text. It is not a commitment to vote for the measure, it does not bind anyone's party, and a long list of cosponsors is a measure of attention rather than of prospects.
Every answer above is assembled from this measure's own record on Congress.gov and from published counts of what Congress has passed before. Civibrief does not predict outcomes and takes no position on any measure.
Vote history
- HousePassed
- SenatePassed
- PresidentSigned into law