Minnesota Nurses Voted!

-jt · May 20, 2001

This same thing happened with the Hawaii Nurses Association nurses in Oahu about a year or 2 ago. The 5 hospitals (Kaiser) on that island all had contracts with their nurses expiring around the same time. The nurses voted to strike all of them & shut down healthcare on the island. Do I need tell you that Kaiser settled all of them & not one had to actually go on strike?? The hospital saw the light after the nurses voted to walk in unity. So 12 out of 13 is nothing for them to sneeze at. Thats a pretty great statement you all made even with the one that voted to accept the contract - but then they didnt vote on the same contract you guys did.

Their hospital broke ranks from the league of hospitals involved & negotiated its OWN contract. Those nurses GOT a contract that DOES address the staffing problem & maybe if the rest of the 12 RN groups had gotten that agreement, you wouldnt have to strike either. THATS the difference in why you all rejected what you were offered & they accepted what they were offered - they GOT what you all wanted. The other 12 RN groups didnt. You were offered 2 DIFFERENT contracts. Keep that point in the forefront.

Btw, how sneaky was that for the hospital to come in & say "if our nurses dont strike, we'll give them whatever the striking nurses fight for & win."?? It kind of leaves a bad taste seeing that those nurses didnt stand together with the other 12 RN groups & are willing to let you fight alone & themselves reap the gains off your sweat & tears.

No matter - 12 hospitals on strike all in one area?? They cant let it happen. That one acceptance of a different contract isnt going to diminsh your power. The rest of the hospitals will have to settle too. They may even just offer you the same thing that other one did & call it a day.

Id focus on why could one hospital see its way clear to address the staffing issue but the other 12 refused to recognize its importance? If one can do it, they all can. Throw it right back at them. That hospital making the offer it did & the RNs accepting it may be a blessing in disguise. Turn it around to your benefit & make the other 12 answer to the community about why they ALL cant do what that one did.

Forget that those nurses left you holding the bag & instead publicly applaud that one hospital for recognizing the importance of addressing the staffing issue. Talk up how enlightened that adminsitration is & what guts it took them to break ranks, not follow the pack or bow to pressure to lower their standards! Publicly acknowledge its committment to its nurses & its pts & the safety of both! Hold it up as a shining star in the group of 13 & make it a hero! Before you know it the community & newspaers will be asking the same question - "yeah! how come THEY can address the staffing problems & try to fix them & the rest of you hospitals wont? Are your pts any less deserving of safe care than theirs are??"

If the administration can come in unprepared, late & in play clothes with their strategies designed to wear you down by showing you how unimportant the negotiations are to them, you can use some war strategies of your own too. Number one - the community.

Another thing, there is no way in hell 7,000 scabs are going to be available to bail them out. Dont even worry about it. "For sure".

ps

There ARE unionized nurses in Texas. Just one example Ive heard of...the VA Hospital in San Antonio apparently has been unionized for years.

-jt · May 20, 2001

- "yeah! how come THEY can address the staffing problems & try to fix them & the rest of you hospitals wont? Are your pts any less deserving of safe care than theirs are??"

oh I like that! (if I do say so myself!)

Give me the link to your newspaper.....

I want to ask the editor.

kjmta57 · May 20, 2001

I wish you all the best and stand strong!!!

willie2001 · May 20, 2001

Nurses need to support one another whether they belong to a union or not. The community where I live and work is very anti-union but I support the Minnesota nurse's right to strike. We all want better and safer patient care, better benefits and wages and better working conditions overall. When we start sticking up for ourselves maybe we will start to get the respect we deserve. We received a notice where I work advertising for nurses to come and work(scabs) in Minnesota during the strike. It was offering $40,$60 and $80 per hour depending on the length of shift. Personally, I think that any nurse who would take advantage of this offer is not very loyal to the profession. I wish you well, Minnesota nusres!!!!

Brian, ASN, RN · May 20, 2001

Here are two recent articles on the Strike Situation:

Minneota Nurse - Strike vote adds dose of doubts (20-May-2001) - Star Tribune https://allnurses.com/news/jump.cgi?ID=552

Twin Cities nurses reject contract (18-May-2001) - KSTP https://allnurses.com/news/jump.cgi?ID=553

nurse57 · May 21, 2001

Yes, Texas is a right to work state, right to work my behind off! I am not afraid of hard work, but what I am afraid of is that something might happen because of shortstaffing. The corporation that owns the nursing home I work in has a different view of adequate staffing than I do. A few of the residents and their families seek me out whether I am their nurse or not. It is hard to explain why things do not get done in a timely manner. Maybe the union is not the answer, but we sure do need something!

Jenny P · May 21, 2001

Sorry, people, I left town for the weekend after that last post and just got back. I guess I neglected to say that each hospital was negotiating on their own separate issues and the the HOSPITAL negotiating teams asked MNA if they would negotiate on the economic and general welfare issues (salaries and working conditions and health benefits) together for the last week of negotiations. That was why the one hospital ratified it's contract-- they agreed to same salary as the other hospitals agreed on (at the final negotiations in these next 2 weeks); but they were agreeing to address patient safety issues (nurse/patient ratios, patient flow, setting aside critical care beds for emergencies, and such) and to address the health benefit problems.

To Stargazer, Jamistlc, Nurse57, Jt, Kjmta57, Willie2001 and Brian Short: thanks to all of you for your words of encouragement. We will need them. Kttaraverty, when we went on strike back in 1984, we were the largest group of nurses to ever strike before; and there were 6000 nurses at 17 (I think) hospitals at the time. Jamistlc, we also are very concerned about the cost of the premiums.

Dplear, I know you have worked as a stikebreaker in the past and you don't like unions; but wouldn't it be great if EVERY nurse at YOUR hospital made the kind of salary that you talked about on another topic? I was polite enough not to ask if some of that $92K you said you earned last year was due to being a scab on that thread. Just think, we are a whole body of nurses trying to raise the salary of nurses to the point that EVERY bedside RN may sometime in the near future be making a DECENT salary; not just one or 2 or a dozen at a specific hospital. I don't see a problem with that, do you? :confused:

Brian, keep posting those news articals; and thanks for the website!

egmillard · May 21, 2001

I voted to Strike, but I am not sure how I am going to pay the bills. I hope this is settled before June 1st.

Dplear · May 21, 2001

First off do not call me a scab nurse! I have worked srtike work in the past. I have a family to support and I have no shame in giving them the lifestyle that I want to give them. I work as a nurse...that is not my identity, my family is my identity.

Also yes I make 92K a year, but none of that last year was from strike work, it is all from a staff position. I worked hard to get to the point where I could make that kind of money and I was not ashamed to ask for it when i negotiated my rate with the hospital. They wanted me and they have to pay to get me. I am anti union, I come from Detriot originally and I grew up there and worked there after high shcool. I saw the UAW and the AFL-CIO strike all the time. Where did that get people back in the 80"s?...they moved to places like Texas(where I live now), to find work because of the demands of unions put alot of places out of work. So yes I am anti-union, If you want to belong to a union so be it, but remeber name another professional that has blue collar type union?

If you really want change in Nursing, I suggest that the change be made internally. You can effect more from the inside than rather from external forces like unions. Feel that staffing is unsafe? Then do something about other than whine and write it up. Go and find a job where you can control staffing. Get into nursing management, there are jobs out there begging to be filled, all you have to do is look for them. You feel that you are not getting enopugh respect?...remeber the only respexct you can get is earned. You have to show respect to get respect, so get rid of the us-vs-them attitude about administration. In all reality they do have the best interest of the pt at heart. After all without good care and CUSTOMER service, the pt's will go elsewhere for their healthcare needs. and when they do that the profits dry up. Yes I said the dirty word profits. You must finally realize that health care IS a business that must make a profit to suceed. without profit they cannot continue to grow and meet the demands of the public. Without profit, where do you think the money for those extra nurses that you cry that you need is going to come from?..the gocvernment? All hospitals need to make money, even the Charity hospitals...so do not throw the Catholic hospital system in my face, I used to work for one of the larges one's in the country, and they made alot of money. It went back into care but they MADE MONEY. And how did they do that? By controlling costs, and labor is a cost. so you want change, get in there and change things not just cry about it. lest you think I am mangaement, I am not. I am a simple staff charge nurse. Nursing is part of a business, and I am a businessman. I will get what I am worth, and nothing less. Heck I have family in Minneapolis ( I was born there) maybe I will take some of my vacation time and go work the strike there...If I do I will make sure to wave at you when I cross that picket line. I will think about you and say thanks quietly when I am cashing that strike breaking paycheck, and I can now afford to do something nice for my family. So thanks ahead of time.

Don't like my opinion and ideas, well to bad, i may not like yours either do feel free to email me and tell me so. After all it is a Free country

Jenny P · May 21, 2001

Dplear, I did not "call" you a scab nurse, those are your words (however, re-reading my post, I guess I did imply it). I am doing something about changing my work situation; I am trying to change the whole financial outlook for nurses. You didn't answer my question: wouldn't it be nice if every bedside RN could earn your salary? Do you think there would be a shortage if our salaries were all that nice?

Here in Minnesota, there has been quite a flap in the media about some of our HMO's and their use of money for their administrative costs. Salespersons get special "perks" such as solid gold golf tees, special golf trips to exclusive resorts for sales incentives, Waterford crystal, etc. There have also been $10,000 laser light shows for some staff picnics, and our State Attorney General is investigating one of the larger health corporations which owns several hospitals for these types of administrative costs. And what are the sales people selling? Why, they are selling the hospitals' services and reputation-- built on the good nursing care patients receive at thes hospitals.

As you said yourself, health care is a business; in my mind, if you take care of the employees that are doing the work that builds your reputation, your business will continue to thrive. Short staffing and overloading a nurses workload will harm the hospitals' reputation. Treating a senior nurse as an indentured slave will cause the nurse to give poor care and/ or leave, thereby increasing the short staffing situation and increasing the cost of replacement; recruiting and orienting another nurse to replace the first nurse doesn't make sound economic sense.

I've been an RN for 32 years, and under this contract (off and on) for about 26 years. We never used to have to request vacation 6 months in advance; we were treated respectfully and we did respect administration. Somewhere in the past 3-5 years, nursing and management styles changed. Consultants were hired here to tell the CEOs where to cut costs- nurses and other employees were not "consulted"; big money (>$850,000 in 8 months last year for 1 consultant here alone!) was spent on people who told the powers that be to use less nurses. No one looked at how sick the patients were/are getting, nor their ages (increasingly older and older), nor how "fragile" these patients and their support systems are. No one other than the nurses talk of the high acuity of the average patient; what happens to teaching when the patient stays in the hospital for shorter and shorter periods of time; don't you wonder how some of your patients and their families cope when that patient is discharged?

Dplear, we are on the same side. We are nurses because we care; we are supposed to be patient advocates; and we are supposed to be supporting our families on our incomes. If you don't like unions, don't post on the thread. It is a free country, and you can do what you want; but expect some hostility if you "diss" someone else.

You want other professions that have unions? How about teachers (they have at least 2). I could probably think of several more if I hadn't spent 7 hours driving in the pouring rain today to get back home. I will add some more here as I think of them.

I refuse to call my patients "clients" or "customers;" look up the three terms in any good dictionary and I believe that PATIENT is the title that best describes the person I care for. And as that persons' nurse, I advocate for them, educate them, empower them, and care for them. :)

imaRN · May 21, 2001

Jenny P. This is for you!! "Way to go MN.Nurses,Best of Luck,Your success will only help other Nurses to make the field better for all!" We are currently at the bargaining tables too, and we "Hope for the Best and prepare for the Worst" My personal opinion about Scab Nurses are- "they do not help the Profession, only weaken it!" Thanks for keeping us informed Jenny P.

timonrn · May 21, 2001

I work at the one hospital that broke the ranks and voted to ratify. My sister also works here and we went into the meeting knowing we would vote to strike. However, after listening to the settlement that this hospital offered and that they added language to address staffing and retainment of nurses (you know the type--train 'em in and 6 weeks later they are off to the clinics or plastic surgeons office to work for MORE money and better benies) no one in their right minds would turn this down. It only shows us that this hospital made a SMART buisiness move to avert a strike by offering us 1.1% more than the rest--19.1% over three years--still a slap in the face, but it DOES NOT MEAN that we NURSES broke rank from the other 12 hospitals, and I very much resent the comment that we left the other nurses holding the bag!! My own mother works at one of the other hospitals that voted to strike who offered their nurses even LESS than the 18% that was quoted--17%!!! You can bet that my sister and I will be walking the picket line with her every day!! And, yes, this could be a good thing--all of the other MNA negotiating teams applauded this hospital and encouraged our own MNA team to advise ratifying. I might add that there are plenty of angry nurses in our own ranks who are picketing the hospital already--kind of makes me think it was only about money (?) for them....Anyways, more power to my sister and brother nurses out there--we here at North are all behind you and will be seeing you on the picket lines--