Federal Times: “The U.S. Postal Service intends to close more than 60 percent of its mail processing plants by the end of next year, potentially displacing thousands of employees. From the current inventory of 508 plants, the agency wants to go to fewer than 200, Dave Williams, vice president of network operations, told participants at a mailing industry conference Wednesday at the Postal Service’s headquarters in downtown Washington. The planned consolidation will be part of a larger “redesign” of the postal processing network aimed at dealing with declining mail volumes, he said. The closings could begin early in 2012…More than 30,000 Postal Service employees will be affected.”