June 3rd, 2010
Sacramento Business Journal: Kaiser mental health workers petition for election
By Kathy Robertson
A majority of 1,300 Northern California mental health professionals at Kaiser Permanente have signed a petition calling for a union election that would allow them to change their union representation from Service Employees International Union-United Health Care Workers (UHW) to a rival started by former SEIU leaders.
June 3 marks the beginning of a 30-day open window when Kaiser employees have a right to change unions, leaders at the National Union of Healthcare Workers say.
But there is a legal dispute over the timing of the election; Kaiser and UHW contend workers can’t vote until June 2011. The Oakland regional office of the National Labor Relations Board told the Business Journal last week there’s a 90- to 120-day window for union elections before the current contract expires Sept. 30.
Members of Kaiser’s Integrated Behavioral Health Services unit, which includes 143 workers in the Sacramento region, plan to file their petition on Thursday, Day One of what they consider the open window.
Almost 2,300 Southern California Kaiser workers -including about 900 psychiatric social workers – already switched to NUHW following a lopsided vote in favor of the rival union in January.
June 3rd, 2010
North Bay Business Journal: Union wins right to represent hospital workers
By Dan Verel
The National Labor Relations Board has sided with the National Union of Healthcare Workers in a long-standing labor dispute with Memorial Hospital.
In a 32-page decision, Administrative Law Judge William Schmidt, writing in Washington, D.C., for the San Francisco branch of the federal labor agency, ruled that the NUHW is “hereby certified as the exclusive collective bargaining representative” of the Santa Rosa hospital, overruling the medical center’s challenge to elections held in December.
In those elections, NUHW soundly defeated its rival and the union from which it broke away from, the Service Employees International Union – United Healthcare Workers West, and narrowly beat those who preferred no union, as the representative body for hospital employees. The final December tally was 283 votes for NUHW, 263 votes for no union and 13 votes for SEIU.
June 2nd, 2010
Kaiser IBHS workers move to join NUHW!
A majority of 1,300 mental health professionals at Kaiser have signed a petition to change their union from SEIU to the National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW), requesting the first Northern California election in a growing effort by Kaiser’s 47,000 SEIU members statewide to take back their union.
June 2nd, 2010
Majority of 1,300 Kaiser mental health professionals petition to join new union
After Southern Calif. professionals joined NUHW in three landslide elections, Northern Calif. pros begin the switch from SEIU
Oakland, Calif.—A majority of 1,300 mental health professionals at Kaiser have signed a petition to change their union from SEIU to the National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW), requesting the first Northern California election in a growing effort by Kaiser’s 47,000 SEIU members statewide to take back their union.
“We’re thrilled for the chance to join the rest of Kaiser’s mental health professionals in a member-run union that will help us improve care for our patients and clients,” said Emily Ryan, a psychiatric social worker at Kaiser Sacramento. “And we’re proud to be the first of the 47,000 Kaiser workers who will petition this month to join NUHW.”
June 2nd, 2010
Beyond Chron: NUHW Defeats SEIU, Management 393-122 in USC Hospital Election
By Randy Shaw
NUHW has overcome a concerted “no-union” campaign from SEIU and hospital management to win bargaining rights for over 600 USC University Hospital workers. NUHW’s 393-122 victory over “no union” followed SEIU’s removal of its name from the ballot last week, claiming that it could not overcome management intimidation of its own members. SEIU had previously spent months in an aggressive anti-NUHW campaign that many believed was designed to bolster management’s own anti-union efforts. NUHW’s victory is sweet vindication for NUHW worker leaders and organizers arrested and disciplined by management in recent weeks, and should have workers asking whether they want a union that runs from management intimidation or stays and fights.