Jes Busselman, a nurse at Abbott Northwester, speaks during MNA’s press conference to announce results of their strike vote.
Members of the Minnesota Nurses Association at 11 Twin Cities hospitals voted yesterday to authorize a strike, escalating their campaign to bargain enforceable nurse-to-patient staffing ratios into their union contracts.
Hospital representatives have outright refused to engage with the union’s staffing proposals – members’ top priority – during negotiations, leaving nurses feeling demoralized and disrespected.
Jes Busselman, a surgical and oncology nurse at Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis, said she and other nurses in the Allina Health system have “poured our hearts out” trying to describe the “brutal reality” of what understaffing in their units means for patient care and nurse morale.
“We’ve given tearful testimony,” she said. “We’ve been brutally honest. And still, Allina’s leaders sit across from us, disinterested, dismissive and unwilling to even have a conversation.”
MNA members allege the hospitals are not bargaining in good faith, and the union has filed several charges of unfair labor practices with the National Labor Relations Board, protecting nurses from being fired or permanently replaced if they do go on strike.
MNA has not set a strike date, and the union must notify hospitals 10 days before any work stoppage begins.
Nurses at Aspirus St. Luke’s and Essentia Health hospitals in Duluth also voted to authorize a strike yesterday, as did MNA bargaining units bringing together clinic and hospice nurses and advanced practitioners in the area.
Altogether, about 15,000 MNA members were eligible to vote. The union does not make specific balloting results public, but said the authorization was “overwhelmingly” approved.
Union Advocate 
[…] support for their bargaining team – at informational picketing June 4 and, later that month, in a strike-authorization vote – put pressure on the hospitals to […]