Hi Scott!
I am responding to your request for information on Spokane.
Why are your moving to Spokane? I moved here from California because I married someone who was Active Duty AF.
To be honest, I have not been happy here at all. I have spent 26 miserable years here, with no end in sight.
Not only does Spokane not have a nursing shortage, we are right next to North Idaho. Idaho bought the big lie, about 20+ years ago, and voted to become a, "right to work", state.
Now Washington IS NOT a Right to Work state, but the economic conditions in Spokane, have made it vulnerable to being tinted by the stench of the Right to Work laws in Idaho. Spokane has always been an economically depressed area. The good jobs are all on the coast. Spokane's most profitable jobs have all been in health care. The economy depends on it. A large Kaiser factory, that was unionized, had good paying jobs, etc, was abruptly closed several ago by a greedy owner who wanted to break the union. When the plant closes, it put over 2000 people, who had living wage jobs, out of work.
It causes a huge hiccup in the Spokane economy, with all of these people out of work with no money to spend in the local economy.
Spokane has unreasonably low pay, and poor benefits as compared to Seattle, but the lower cost of living does not account for the low pay. Sacred Heart nurses are unionized with WSNA, and they do ok with them, not great.
But Sacred Heart is much better than Deaconess. Both Deaconess and Sacred Heart were non profits, and Sacred Heart, a Catholic hospital is still non profit. When Deaconess was bough out by Community Health, they are a for profit, and it shows.
Deaconess was owned by Empire Health for many years and was going under financially a few years ago. They were bought out by Community Health from Tennessee. A notorious, for profit, anti union company. Things were bad under Empire Health, so the employees unionized. Deaconess has been a bastion of anti union sentiment, forever. The nurses reluctantly unionized under 1199,under Empire Health, and with the coaching of Community Health, stirring the anti union sentiment, the nurses voted out 1199, a few short years later.
The other department who unionized, Radiology, Lab, etc, remain unionized with 1199.
Sacred Heart is my winner, hands down, over Deaconess. They each own smaller hospitals - Sacred Heart owns Holy Family in the North side of town, and Deaconess owns Valley Hospital in the Spokane Valley. Valley Hospital nurses have remained unionized with 1199.
If you have experience, you should not have trouble getting a job. I would check their websites, and see what is available.
I do not know what the pay scales are. You can check the WSNA web site and look at the union contract. Deaconess has to stay close, pay and benefits wise, or they would not have any nurses.
Spokane has many schools of nursing right here in town- Spokane Community College, RN, and LPN programs, Washington State, Gonzaga University, Whitworth, College, BSN, right across the border in Idaho, is North Idaho College. ADN, Boise and Boise State, and I believe Lewis And Clark College have BSN and Masters programs as does the above college BSN programs, there are also ADN programs throughout Washington State, and programs in Idaho and Oregon.
There are also several BSN and ADN programs in Seattle/Tacoma/Olympia.
The Tricities area of Washington State, also has nice hospitals This is located in South Central Washington State and is comprises of Richland, Kennewick and Pasco. They are all right next to each other, hence the name, "Tricities". They also have their share of nursing programs. Tricities is right across the border to Oregon.
Nurses have NEVER been treated especially well in Spokane.
If you look at all of the nursing programs available, churning out new grads every six months, the, "right to work", right next door in Idaho, you can see why. I am glad that I am retired.
PM me if you decide to move here, and I can show your around. Good Luck.
Lindarn, RN, BSN, CCRN,(ret)
Somewhere in the PACNW
