UW Well being nurses vote to strike if SEIU union not acknowledged
MADISON – Lots of of nurses with UW Well being voted Wednesday to carry a three-day strike in September if hospital directors don’t acknowledge their union, an escalation in a yearslong combat to regain bargaining rights.
The vote, taken over two separate Zoom calls that ended at 9 p.m., units the clock ticking for the UW Well being Board and directors to satisfy with nurses and comply with once more negotiate with their union, SEIU Healthcare Wisconsin. If they do not, the hospital system may see nurses taking part in a strike from 7 a.m. Sept. 13 till 7 a.m. Sept. 16.
Zach Sielaff, 39, has labored for 9 months as a pediatric working room nurse at American Household Youngsters’s Hospital in Madison. He was among the many 99% of nurses who voted to maneuver ahead with the strike.
“We’re able to take this step and strike as a result of the hospital hasn’t left us another choices,” Sielaff stated. “We’re giving the hospital discover and sufferers in the long run will get higher care than they’re getting now.”
Emily Kumlien, a UW Well being spokesperson, referred to as the choice by SEIU to authorize a strike “disappointing.”
“They’ll hurt sufferers realizing that their actions is not going to acquire them a solution to those authorized questions,” Kumlien stated in a press release Thursday. “They may also hurt sufferers realizing there’s a higher possibility.”
College of Wisconsin Hospital and Clinic Authority, the formal identify for the well being care system, contains a number of clinics within the better Madison space, in addition to UW Well being (hospital), Madison East Hospital and the American Household Youngsters’s Hospital. The system is among the many greatest in Wisconsin. It employs 3,400 nurses, with the union estimated to incorporate 2,600 nurses.
Nurses interviewed by USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin stated they’re leaving the door open for dialogue with prime administration.
If administration doesn’t acknowledge the union, the nurses will present a 10-day discover to UW Well being so directors could make preparations to make sure affected person security, as is required by federal labor legislation.
Nurse shortages blamed for burnout, excessive affected person hundreds
The vote comes throughout a nationwide nursing scarcity — a scarcity the Wisconsin Hospital Affiliation stated in a March report had reached “a tipping level,” a actuality exacerbated in Wisconsin by lengthy delays on the state’s licensing company.
Because the COVID-19 pandemic drags into its third 12 months, the shortages have contributed to burnout and considerations amongst nurses over more and more increased staff-to-patient ratios. Nurses throughout the nation, together with earlier this month in Minnesota, are threatening to strike if working circumstances don’t enhance.
Previous to Wednesday’s vote, greater than 1,500 UW Well being nurses signaled their help for a union by signing an internet type — first in 2019 and once more this 12 months.
Wisconsin hospitals with SEIU Healthcare Wisconsin nurses’ unions embody Meriter Hospital in Madison, Aspirus Riverview in Wisconsin Rapids, Gundersen Well being in La Crosse and ThedaCare in Appleton. These nurses wouldn’t be taking part within the strike, as their unions are acknowledged by their employers.
Legal professional normal opinion opens door for union recognition
The vote for union recognition has been brewing since 2011 when the state Legislature, underneath the path of former Republican Gov. Scott Walker, handed Act 10. Beneath that state legislation, UW Well being was faraway from the state’s Labor Peace Act, which required UW Well being to acknowledge worker unions and collectively discount with them.
When Walker was defeated by Democratic Gov. Tony Evers in 2018, the push to search out readability on the flexibility to unionize intensified.
Within the opinion of the nurses, that readability got here on June 2 when Wisconsin Legal professional Basic Josh Kaul — at Evers’ request after he met just about with greater than 400 nurses — issued a proper opinion that acknowledged College of Wisconsin Hospitals and Clinics Authority can select to voluntarily have interaction within the collective bargaining course of with its nurses, however it isn’t required to take action.
And that’s the authorized rub now standing between the nurses and the hospital’s prime directors.
“Whereas UW Well being can respect the thought of social activism, whether or not anybody helps or opposes recognizing a union to interact in collective bargaining is irrelevant till we decide whether or not one is legally allowed,” Kumlien stated.
Previous to Kaul’s opinion, UW Well being CEO Dr. Alan Kaplan cited different authorized opinions in a December 2021 letter to workers, writing “no additional motion may be taken (by way of recognizing a nurses union) till present state legal guidelines are modified.”
Kumlien reiterated Kaplan’s view Thursday and stated it’s the hospital’s place the well being system can not legally collectively discount underneath Act 10.
“The lawyer normal has stated he believes we are able to, however by his personal admission, states that his opinion shouldn’t be legislation and that solely the courts or the Legislature can present a conclusive reply,” Kumlien stated. “UW Well being is not going to violate the legislation.”
‘I’m standing up for my sufferers,’ nurse says
Shari Signer has labored for UW Well being for 19 years.
In contrast to Sielaff and different nurses employed after 2014, she is aware of what’s was wish to work at UW Hospital earlier than nurses misplaced their union and collective bargaining rights when their contract expired in 2014, as a consequence of Act 10.
“I’m standing up for my sufferers,” she stated when requested why a strike was mandatory. “And I’m searching for my youthful colleagues who don’t know what it’s wish to work at an incredible hospital, like UW was.”
Colin Gillis went to work at UW Hospital after graduating from UW-Madison’s Faculty of Nursing in 2017. Employed by the UW for 5 years, he works the in a single day shift as a cost nurse on a unit the place nurses have been caring for COVID-19 sufferers because the begin of the pandemic.
Gillis stated the primary time he took care of a COVID-19 affected person, he and different nurses have been carrying N-95 masks, the respirator masks that present the best stage of safety towards the airborne virus. Gillis stated the nurses have been taking a brand new masks into each affected person’s room and discarding it as they walked out.
By the second month of the pandemic, nurses have been allowed to make use of solely surgical masks, he stated. He stated nurses have been informed the swap needed to be made again to surgical masks so as “to ration N-95s,” which have been in excessive demand and scarce provide at the moment.
“These masks afford some safety, however they do not afford the most effective safety,” Gillis stated. “We knew that and directors knew that.”
Nurses stated they obtained phrase earlier this week that those that participated within the strike and didn’t present up for his or her shifts can be handled as a “no-call, no-show.”
“It’s outrageous that the hospital is threatening to self-discipline us and probably hearth us for exercising our authorized proper to strike,” Gillis stated. “It’s unforgivable.”
Jessica Van Egeren is a watchdog and social justice editor with USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin. Contact her at jvanegeren@gannett.com or 920-213-5695.
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