Been getting calls from SEIU?

Nurses Union

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Specializes in med/surg.

I got 3 calls from SEIU. I could not understand their accents and the first 2 hung up on me when I asked them to repeat what they were saying. The 3rd call was from an english speaking male whom I understand what he was saying. He was asking me 3 questions how CNA had bullied SEIU in Ohio. (connected to the HSA). I gave him an earful. Then they emailed me their web site "Shame on CNA." Pretty ugly stuff. I couldn't quite get the jist of how CNA "destroyed their union." What do you think? Where did they get my phone numbers and email address?

Red

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I'm from Ohio, and I know some of the facts around this story. Nurses and other employees at 9 or 10 hospitals in Ohio had been trying to get a vote for three years and were just a couple days from voting union. Dozens of CNA organizers showed up at the hospitals, snuck into them, and ran a "vote no" campaign. It seems like it caused the same sorts of doubts and anxiety that a "vote no" campaign by management causes. Anyway, the elections had to be cancelled and those employees do not have a union. Check out the union website. They have a lot of good links and background: www.seiu1199.org. I don't know if I've seen http://www.shameoncna.com.

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I think SEIU got our names from the state BRN. I received a call last week. I was amazed that the caller didn't know any of the background surrounding the survey questions he was asking. I later found out that he was a minimum wage telemarketer that SEIU hired to do these "push polling" kinds of things---someone who probably doesn't have benefits or a decent wage working for SEIU---what irony!

Does the BRN have our email address? I didn't get an email from them. I don't know how they got that kind of private information.

After I found out that these telemarketers were not SEIU organizers, but minimum wage workers, I felt bad that I had given mine an earful.

But this kind of invasion of privacy is exactly why nurses loathe SEIU.

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Specializes in med/surg.
I think SEIU got our names from the state BRN. I received a call last week. I was amazed that the caller didn't know any of the background surrounding the survey questions he was asking. I later found out that he was a minimum wage telemarketer that SEIU hired to do these "push polling" kinds of things---someone who probably doesn't have benefits or a decent wage working for SEIU---what irony!

Does the BRN have our email address? I didn't get an email from them. I don't know how they got that kind of private information.

After I found out that these telemarketers were not SEIU organizers, but minimum wage workers, I felt bad that I had given mine an earful.

But this kind of invasion of privacy is exactly why nurses loathe SEIU.

You know, now that you asked, I am not sure they emailed me. I think he suggested that I visit the website "shame on cna." But I am po'd that the BRN gave them our phone numbers. Minimum wage telemarkets. How professional! I'd really love to join a union like that, wouldn't you?

Red

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Specializes in med/surg.
You know, now that you asked, I am not sure they emailed me. I think he suggested that I visit the website "shame on cna." But I am po'd that the BRN gave them our phone numbers. Minimum wage telemarkets. How professional! I'd really love to join a union like that, wouldn't you?

Red

P.S. Doesn't the fact the HSA is part of the union give the nurses a clue?

Red

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Specializes in ICU/CCU/TRAUMA/ECMO/BURN/PACU/.

As far as I can tell, they didn't have a union at the CHP facilities in Ohio. The bosses filed for an election and only SEIU or vote No union was on the ballot. Then the bosses called off the election at the behest of SEIU when they realized the nurses were going to vote no. They're blaming everyone but themselves; so immature and disingenuous.

The bosses win in a partnership; the patients and their nurses would be the biggest losers in such a scheme. Check out this video made by SEIU RNs in Nevada:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cgueWv0CAY&eurl=http://www.calnurses.org/seiu-watch/

As for the phone calls, I think it's a shame they waste their members' dues on that kind of disinformation campaign. No wonder so many members like the Nevada nurses in the video want out.

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When SEIU attempted to unionize my home health agency employer a few years ago, members of the organizing committee and union members started to harass employees and clients with unsolicited visits, phone calls, etc. They actually went to patient homes when employees were there. The employer was barraged by requests from employees who were being bothered after expressing their desire not to be contacted, for assistance in stopping the behavior. The patient families complained. The employer contacted the union and informed them there would be police involvement and legal action. The behavior toned down prior to the election. However, it never fully stopped. The employer sent letters to the employees telling them to call the police should they be approached at patient homes or otherwise.

The home addresses of the nurses were provided to the union by the State Boards. This practice is common. The mailing lists can be bought by any organization if they follow the requirements of the Board. A member of the Board provided information that individual nurses could send a written request to the Board to keep their contact info confidential. I forget the phrase that was used. However, the Board representative warned that getting placed on the"confidential" list would also prevent a nurse from receiving other info that might be beneficial to the nurse. If anyone wants to stop their contact info from being made available to the public, I suggest they contact their State Board, in writing, and make this request. This is also good advice to nurses who find themselves on the receiving end of stalking behavior, although any stalker will find easier ways of finding out the whereabouts of their prey.

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Specializes in Telemetry, CCU.

I'm sorry that you've had bad experiences with SEIU. I am a member of SEIU and thanks to the union we have no mandatory overtime, fair employee advancement, free medical/dental/vision, a pension plan, more PTO and a cushion between the floor nurses and management. I am not trying to toot anyone's horn, but I'm happy and proud to be a part of this union. Too bad they have people calling nurses at home, like telemarketers do, and I can understand how that would taint your image of SEIU.

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Specializes in med/surg.
I'm sorry that you've had bad experiences with SEIU. I am a member of SEIU and thanks to the union we have no mandatory overtime, fair employee advancement, free medical/dental/vision, a pension plan, more PTO and a cushion between the floor nurses and management. I am not trying to toot anyone's horn, but I'm happy and proud to be a part of this union. Too bad they have people calling nurses at home, like telemarketers do, and I can understand how that would taint your image of SEIU.

well, it is good to see something positive. I'm glad for you. It's hard to really know what's happening sometimes when there is so much mud slinging going around.

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Specializes in Telemetry, CCU.
well, it is good to see something positive. I'm glad for you. It's hard to really know what's happening sometimes when there is so much mud slinging going around.

Just this week we've had CNA on site, passing around their brochures and trying to bust up our union. Its a little too coincidental that we are in bargaining right now. So yes, it is a little hard to know what's happening sometimes, I always thought CNA was good until I heard what they did in Ohio....

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Specializes in community health.

SEIU international has sent out about 50 organizers to harass CNA RN leaders in their homes yesterday and have tried to stir up havock in CNA-represented facilities.

The heart of the matter... lies in the fact that SEIU International has created a harmful company union structure where the "union" partners with management to the detriment of their members. This is especially dangerous and harmful when you represent healthcare workers who work in unsafe conditions and goes against a licensed nurse's ethical and legal obligation to be a patient advocate.

The unfortunate outcomes harm patients as well as caregivers as detailed in a recent SF Weekly article. The article is a must read from start to finish, but I feel compelled to excerpt the part about the tragic death of Mary Hochman, a night nurse and SEIU member who worked at Beverley La Cumbre, a Santa Barbara nursing home:

(Read the full story here http://www.sfweekly.com/2008-04-02/news/nursing-home-lobbyist-quits-after-he-predicts-seiu-power-play/full)

According to news accounts, Hochman walked onto a beach and shot herself in the heart after a months-long dispute with her employer. Her problems began when she tried to report that a nurse's aide had hit an 81-year-old man with dementia. According to Contra Costa Times reporter Carolyn McMillan, Hochman said in a sworn affidavit that she was told to cover up the information.

"If a nurse cannot protect her patients, I do not want to be a nurse," Hochman wrote in her suicide note. "This has taken all hope away from me."Hochman's note, along with a journal detailing instances where she was told to cover up incidents of abuse and neglect, helped spur a federal raid on the nursing home.

A subsequent investigation revealed patients suffering beatings and maggot-infested bedsores, culminating in a $2 million settlement against Beverly relating to preventable deaths. The investigation also spawned a dozen civil suits, according to press reports. SEIU had lobbied to ensure that a bill before the California legislature "didn't include provisions supported by patients' rights groups that would have set standards guaranteeing high-quality care.

The union added hundreds of nursing home workers to its ranks. But the labor contracts that resulted included a scandalous detail: The union was discouraged from informing regulators, or the press, in cases of bad patient care.

Under traditional contracts, whistle-blowers such as Hochman could report abuses to the union and feel protected. The Alliance contracts, however, seemed to have the opposite intent. Under Stern's "modern" collaborative strategy, such protections are apparently worth sacrificing to grow the union.

CNA/NNOC is proud of our record in fighting for RNs and safe patient care, from winning the first-in-the nation RN-to-patient ratios, to fighting Governor Schwarzenegger's attacks on our ratios and on the Board of Registered Nurses to building a national nurse's movement to fight for the highest standards nationally for RNs and patients.

Building a national nurses movement isn't always going to be easy, but it will all be worth it when we change the face of healthcare in this country.

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Specializes in med/surg.
Just this week we've had CNA on site, passing around their brochures and trying to bust up our union. Its a little too coincidental that we are in bargaining right now. So yes, it is a little hard to know what's happening sometimes, I always thought CNA was good until I heard what they did in Ohio....

This is such a horrific scene for the LTCs. Although I worked for two LTCs, I was fired because I reported abuses and dangerous conditions to administrators of these 2 facilities that did not correct these conditions, I as an RN, mandated by the State to report these incidents to the State, because they would not correct the conditions, was fired from both facilities for retaliation. I filed a lawsuit against the first one. My lawyer said he would take it as a contingency and said it would settle and not go to trial. He called me months later and and wanted me to sign something allowing him to dismiss himself from the case because "he was wasn't making any money." I was never told I had to go to that hearing and the lawyers caused the court to sanction me to pay $1220 to the defendant, apparently because "I was so uncooperative." And I am told I will lose thousands of dollars because no other lawyer will represent me. I was fired from a hospital along with a long time RN, whose union for us both was CNA. I have yet to get to the arbitration, but the other RN, I am told CNA won a very large money amount for this RN.

I know this has nothing to do with SEIU, but patients in nursing homes are litterly abused and killed off for profit. CNA also is the union for the ancillary workers of this hospital.

I just can't fathom any of these issues anymore. I am so traumatized by it all. You can't advocate for your patients, or either your sanity or career is destroyed. The CNA does represent the CNAs, ancillary workers, etc. That in itself is dangerous. Especially, the ........... staff. patients are neglected and put in danger, and the DON says "I can't control all of them, they are in a protected class."

As I said, I know nothing about SEIU, but I think it is telling that they are hooked up with management. Healthcare is not safe in this country anymore. Peope in LTC anywhere are only there for the profit of the Corporations. They are not considered human beings.

John McCain referred to something, I forget, about "Corporate Greed." If you think the housing crunch and oil is bad and people while contemplating all the money they were going to get, think what it's going to be like when the whole LTC system greed falls apart. Unions included.

Sorry to rant, but greed just flows from one sector the other.

I got another bitter flyer in the mail today about CNA interfering with ancillary workers by CNA. The CNA union rep who is handling my arbitration is their union rep, although I think it is under another name.

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