Daily printout: Nov. 3

USPS Hazmat Awareness Month — an annual campaign that focuses on efforts to safely identify, handle and deliver mailable hazardous materials — begins Saturday, Nov. 1.

The organization is reminding all employees to always examine packages for hazmat markings and to ask customers if a parcel contains anything potentially hazardous — including metallic mercury and items containing metallic mercury, which are prohibited in the mailstream.

Mercury is a toxic chemical that even when exposed in small amounts — through inhalation, ingestion or skin contact — may cause serious health conditions.

When spilled, mercury can be absorbed into the skin and emit vapors that can produce harmful effects on the lungs and kidneys and the nervous, digestive and immune systems.

The Postal Service continues to improve its longstanding hazmat policies and procedures to help prevent incidents, such as adding lithium battery marking, packaging and transport mode requirements; and controlling limits and packaging standards for corrosive fluids, including prohibiting highly corrosive fluids such as mercury that can leak and cause burns.

The organization’s efforts also include focused communication and coordination with shippers, enhanced systems to accept and process packages that contain hazardous materials, and the best use of data to correct deficiencies.

Other measures include refreshed training for employees, improvements to the system used to report hazmat incidents, new signage and visual aids in Post Office retail lobbies and processing facilities, and continued work with the Postal Inspection Service to address hazmat incidents.

During USPS Hazmat Awareness Month, the Postal Service will distribute communications to reinforce policies and procedures to keep the organization’s network safe.

This includes promoting the use of public materials such as Poster 37, Is Your Package Safe to Mail? and Poster 318, Civil Penalty Notice; and the use of employee materials such as Poster 298, Domestic Hazardous Materials — Warning Labels and Markings, Poster 81, How to Reuse a Box for Shipping, Poster 702, Prohibited in International Mail — Dangerous Goods Warning Labels and Publication 52 — Hazardous, Restricted, and Perishable Mail.

The Postal Service will observe Native American Heritage Month, which honors the Indigenous peoples and cultures of the United States, during November.

The observance began in 1990 with a joint resolution approved by President George H.W. Bush proclaiming November as “National American Indian Month.” All presidents have followed suit each year, but in 2009, “Native American” replaced “American Indian” in its name.

USPS has issued scores of stamps celebrating Native American subjects over the years, beginning with a 4-cent stamp of a buffalo hunt in 1898. The most recent is Powwows: Celebrating Native American Culture, which was released in April.

Other recent stamps include Chief Standing Bear, which honors the Ponca chieftain who won his freedom in court, setting an important legal precedent for Native Americans; George Morrison, commemorating the Chippewa modernist artist; Raven Story, referencing a mythological trickster character important to several Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest; and Art of the Skateboard, featuring designs from two Indigenous artists.

Approximately 4,096 Postal Service employees identify as Native American or Alaska Native.

The Postal Service will highlight its Save Vanishing Species semipostal stamp in November.

Semipostal stamps are First-Class Mail stamps sold at a price above the cost of a regular stamp to raise funds for designated causes.

Save Vanishing Species has raised more than $8.2 million for its causes since its introduction in 2011. Nearly 69 million have been sold.

Proceeds from the stamp are transferred to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which distributes the money to multinational conservation funds protecting endangered species. These include African and Asian elephants, apes, rhinos, tigers and marine turtles.  

The stamp features an illustrated portrait of an Amur tiger cub, one of five tiger subspecies. This single, powerful image is intended to represent all imperiled animals.

USPS facility leaders and employees can promote the stamp in November but must follow the organization’s rules on semipostal stamp activities.

Employees with questions about these activities should email the USPS Ethics Office.