Registered
Nurses & Healthcare Workers Stand Together in Informational Picket and Strike
Vote
New York healthcare unions NYSNA
and 1199 SEIU unite to battle bad-faith bargaining, Unfair Labor Practices and
union busting during two-year negotiation struggle with Fresenius Kidney Care
By John
Pietaro
It was a
chilly, overcast morning as members of the New York State Nurses Association
and 1199 SEIU took the Brooklyn and Bronx streets. Registered Nurses,
Technicians, Social Workers, Dietitians, environmental and clerical staff have
been in contract negotiations with dialysis juggernaut Fresenius Kidney Care for
over two years. Both unions’ negotiation proceedings have been riddled with
negativity from the employer, globally the largest and most profitable of dialysis
providers. Fresenius boasts a dense network of facilities across the Americas, Europe,
the Far East and other regions. Recent reports state that the company’s profits
are in the range of $1.5 BILLION.
“Our
clinic is staffed short almost every night”, said Stacey White RN, a Fresenius
employee and NYSNA delegate. “All I can say is that Fresenius just doesn’t seem
to care. Many evenings, we have only two instead of the necessary three nurses
on duty--and management has no plan to bring in another. Techs are scheduled
the same way. This can jeopardize our patients’ safety”. The union healthcare
professionals and technicians have regularly voiced their protest to such dangerous
staffing practices.
Bernadette
Hankey-Johnson RN, long-time Fresenius employee, felt similarly. “We are always
so busy. If the nurses and Techs weren’t so vigilant…” Nurse Hankey-Johnson
looked away pensively, tightly clutching a placard reading PATIENTS BEFORE PROFITS. In
the distance others on the line began cheering as truckers’ horns sounded out
in support. The thicket of traffic on Atlantic Avenue joined in noisily, excitedly.
HONK FOR PATIENT CARE! another
placard asked, and passing police cars rang sirens resoundingly.
The unions
involved have bargained in good faith toward fair contracts, seeking to
maintain union health benefits and pensions, and acquire moderate raises and incremental
differential increases for experience. Employees’ last saw raises more than six
years back. NYSNA is also seeking a clinical committee to elicit change as
needed for safe staffing. However Fresenius continues to present harsh
proposals which would take away health benefits and pensions or obliterate union
security. The choices have been flagrantly disrespectful.
In 2015 Fresenius
closed the Brooklyn Kidney Center, a union facility, and initially stated that
the clinic opening in its place would continue to honor the twin union
contracts. Though management and the unions met to arrange for the laid-off
staff to move to the new site, Fresenius leadership later informed the unions that
the company will not honor its earlier promise. The company claims that
the site on DeGraw Street in Gowanus is not a replacement but a new operation.
Many Fresenius employees remain laid-off after the closure and none have been
offered work opportunities at the expansive DeGraw site. NYSNA filed charges of
Unfair Labor Practice with the National Labor Relations Board against
Fresenius’ actions.
As more
staff came out to join the picket, they stated that management, for the first
time in memory, had ordered in lunch for them. “But none of us are partaking”,
reported Mercedes Anderson-Draggon RN. “Because this lunch they’re offering is
not free. The ultimate cost is too high”.
By day’s
end, as the strike vote was tallied, it was clear that both NYSNA and 1199 SEIU
members were fully prepared for to embark on whatever was necessary: all had
voted to authorize a strike. 1199 will be meeting with Fresenius for a
negotiation session on April 26; NYSNA activists will be there with them. The
outcome of this will be the actual deciding vote as to what comes next. “We
don’t want to strike”, one of the unionists told a sympathetic passerby, “but
we will if we have to”.