HealthPartners workers strike at Stillwater Medical Group

July 8, 2025 by

SEIU bargaining team members Heather Eggers (L) and Ellie Conway lead a rally on the picket line at Stillwater Medical Group.

United “like never before,” a bargaining unit of 80 workers at HealthPartners Stillwater Medical Group began a four-day strike this morning, escalating their campaign for a new union contract that delivers wage gains and longevity bonuses.

Members of SEIU Healthcare Minnesota and Iowa on strike at SMG include licensed practical nurses, certified medical assistants and other workers in the facility’s family-medicine, OB/GYN, pediatrics and specialties departments.

On the picket line, union members said they felt stung by HealthPartners’ decision to fork over money to temporary workers and pay overtime wages, rather than meet their bargaining team halfway and avoid a strike.

Workers voted last month, with near-unanimous support, to authorize a strike. In talks since then, the employer “has barely moved in their proposals,” LPN and bargaining team member Kelly Parent said.

“We tried to come down with our numbers,” CMA Ellie Conway, another member of the bargaining team, added. “Unfortunately, they didn’t reciprocate.”

Heather Eggers, a CMA and union negotiator, said SMG workers have taken on more responsibilities in recent years, as the facility struggled with short staffing. She said HealthPartners needs to offer more than just a “thank you.”

“The cost of living is rising, and we need HealthPartners to step up,” Eggers said. “They keep saying we are working together for the common good. If that’s the case, then why isn’t our leadership working for us, the workers?”

Workers walk the picket line at HealthPartners Stillwater Medical Group.

Although SMG is under the HealthPartners umbrella, workers’ wages and benefits lag behind those earned by many of their peers in the system. SMG workers bargain on their own, outside a larger SEIU contract that covers over two dozen HealthPartners sites in the metro.

“We’re doing the same work for the same company,” said Conway, who has worked at SMG for over five years. “We believe we deserve the same wages and bonuses.”

SMG workers don’t expect to make up the difference with one contract, but Conway said they intend to do better than the “chump change” in HealthPartners’ most recent proposal, which amounts to raises of less than $1 per hour for many in the bargaining unit.

“We refuse to accept that this is the best HealthPartners has to offer us,” she said. “It feels like the money makes its way to corporate leadership but skips right past the front line.”

The unit came into contract negotiations this spring fired up, having beat back an attempt to decertify their union just weeks before bargaining began. Workers voted to keep their union, with 72% support.

“The employer was very vocal in the decertification about how they could work with us so much better without a union,” Conway said. “Fortunately, the members saw through those empty promises.

“Like never before, our union is ready to stand together and demand better working conditions.”

Union members plan to picket from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. each day of the strike, scheduled to end Friday. SMG is located at 1500 Curve Crest Blvd.

– Michael Moore, Union Advocate editor

Filed Under: Organizing, Union Events Tagged With: , , , , , ,

GOP’s Medicaid cuts would raise costs for everyone, union report finds

June 18, 2025 by

Kerry Adelmann, a home care worker and member of SEIU Healthcare MN & IA, shared what Medicaid cuts would mean to her family. Health care workers joined community and faith leaders today on the Capitol steps in St. Paul to demand Republicans in Congress walk back historic cuts to Medicaid included in their budget bill, which President Trump wants on his desk by July 4. 

Meanwhile, a new analysis from the AFL-CIO warns those cuts will make health care less affordable not just for the 7.8 million people projected to lose their benefits, but also for the 179 million Americans with employer-sponsored health coverage – by as much as $485 annually per person. 

That’s because, experts say, people without insurance still get sick, but they are more likely to show up in urgent-care clinics and emergency rooms, driving up costs across the health care system. 

“They’re going to go without care until they have to show up to the hospitals that are required to provide that emergency care,” Jessica Intermill, an activist with Protect Our Care Minnesota, said. “But if this big, bad-for-Americans bill passes, those hospitals and doctors won’t get paid for their work. 

“You can’t stop paying for $700 billion worth of care in the United States without a catastrophic impact.” 

That’s the amount by which the House version of the bill, passed last month, would cut Medicaid. A Senate version that cleared a key committee hurdle earlier this week would make even deeper cuts, forcing difficult decisions onto hospitals and state governments in order to close the gap. 

Rachel Anderson is a vice president of National Nurses United.The Walz administration projects that Minnesota will lose about $500 million in Medicaid funding annually under the GOP budget. 

The state’s Medicaid director, John Connolly, said the bill advancing through the Senate would be “even worse,” with new paperwork requirements and other administrative hurdles that will make it harder for eligible people to access – and maintain – benefits. 

“Disenrollment,” Connolly added, is very much the point of the legislation, which aims to “shrink the number of people with Medicaid coverage, regardless of their need or eligibility status.” 

In addition to making health care less affordable, the Republican budget is likely to spark widespread job losses as states and hospitals look to absorb the loss of federal funds.  

More than 600,000 front-line health care workers could be fired, the AFL-CIO analysis found, and funding for other state-budget priorities, like schools, public safety and infrastructure projects, could be in jeopardy. 

If there’s good news to be found in the Republicans’ so-called “big, beautiful bill,” it comes for corporations and the wealthiest Americans, who will overwhelmingly benefit from the $3.7 trillion tax cut paid for by slashing Medicaid and food assistance. 

“There is nothing beautiful about this bill,” said Rachel Anderson, a member of the Minnesota Nurses Association who works at Fairview Southdale. “And there is one big reason why nurses oppose it: Medicaid cuts kill people.” 

 — Michael Moore, UA editor

Filed Under: Community, Politics Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Labor groups applaud St. Paul’s move to allow administrative fines

February 6, 2025 by

New civil fines will allow the City of St. Paul to enforce labor standards more effectively. That includes the city’s $15 minimum wage, which workers fought to pass in 2018.

In a move praised by worker advocates, St. Paul City Council members voted unanimously Jan. 22 to allow the city to issue administrative citations.

The vote to amend the city charter, supporters said, will allow St. Paul to enforce its labor standards and other ordinances more effectively and equitably by issuing civil fines, rather than getting entangled in costly, sometimes lengthy legal battles.

It’s a tool other large cities in Minnesota have at their disposal – and for good reason, St. Paul Regional Labor Federation President Kera Peterson told council members during a public hearing on the amendment Jan. 15.

“It would allow the city to avoid burdening people with criminal convictions, and it would absolutely make a difference for low wage workers who are not being paid fairly in our city,” Peterson said. “The City of St. Paul should add it to their toolkit.”

In recent years the city has passed an ordinance establishing its own minimum wage, as well as wage-theft and sick-time ordinances, with enforcement falling on the Department of Human Rights and Equal Economic Opportunity (HREEO).

But until now, the only enforcement option available to HREEO staff who identified a violation was criminal charges.

With administrative citations, the process will play out without going to court.

“The current system rewards people who are wealthy and can afford to fight the city and drag things out,” SEIU Healthcare Minnesota and Iowa’s Rick Varco told council members.

That creates an incentive, SEIU member Tavona Johnson added, for “wealthy corporations to break the law and force low-wage workers to do something about it.”

“Under the current system, employers can threaten to clog the courts and run out the clock,” Johnson, who lives in St. Paul, added. “I have lived paycheck to paycheck, and these delays and lost wages hurt.”

“If you’re a low-wage worker, any delay in getting the wages that you’ve earned can be devastating,” UNITE HERE Local 17 Secretary-Treasurer Sheigh Freeberg said.

St. Paul renters, small business owners and community members joined labor activists at the public hearing, where the overwhelming majority of speakers voiced support for administrative citations.

The fines could also make it easier for the city to enforce its housing codes and compel owners of vacant or blighted properties to make improvements. Tonette Clardy, a homeowner in Ward 4, complained to council members about a vacant building in her neighborhood that was recently condemned.

“As a Black homeowner, I’m afraid this building will bring down my property values, which hurts my ability to build wealth for my family,” Clardy said. “I want to make sure the building owner is held accountable, and at the same time, I don’t think they should go to jail.”

Filed Under: Labor Voices Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

OPEIU members warn HealthPartners they’re ‘not going back’ on health benefits

December 13, 2024 by

Local 12 members rallied outside HealthPartners’ offices in Bloomington on a day that saw the union hold informational picketing at over 30 locations across the metro.

Members of Office and Professional Employees (OPEIU) Local 12 held informational picketing Nov. 26 at the 31 HealthPartners offices and clinics across the Twin Cities where they work, hoping to give the health provider a preview of what’s coming if workers are forced to strike.

The picketing, held four days before OPEIU members’ contract was set to expire, drew solidarity from members of SEIU Healthcare Minnesota and Iowa who also work at HealthPartners.

At a rally outside HealthPartners’ corporate offices in Bloomington, Local 12 members blasted the organization’s executives for pleading poverty at the bargaining table while their CEO earns $1,500 per hour – more than many members earn in a pay period.

OPEIU members are sticking to three priorities in bargaining: maintaining their health insurance benefits, raising wages to keep up with inflation and ending abuse and harassment on the job.

“I don’t get paid enough to get abused over the phone,” Tia Burnett, a Local 12 member and clinic assistant HealthPartners’ Woodbury facility. “I’m one of the many people here who work three jobs. I’m a single person with no kids, and I’m still struggling to make ends meet due to the fact that I’m not getting paid enough.”

The union said HealthPartners has demanded a 400% increase to members’ health insurance premiums and out-of-pocket costs. At the rally in Bloomington, which union members at other locations were looped into via Zoom, bargaining team member Paula Moyer called the employers’ health benefit proposal “punitive and outrageous.”

“We know we have great benefits, but the benefits we have fought for are what we think everyone in the country should have,” Moyer, a clinic assistant, said. “We’re not going back.”

Local 12 members work at the front desks and check-ins at clinics and in support positions such as scheduling, claims and accounting.

– Michael Moore, Union Advocate editor

Filed Under: Organizing Tagged With: , , , , ,

Worker advocates welcome St. Paul’s new wage theft law

December 10, 2024 by

Supporters of a measure to crack down on wage theft were pictured during a rally at the Minnesota Capitol in 2019.

St. Paul will have a new wage theft ordinance on the books Jan. 1.

The measure, pushed by Mayor Melvin Carter and co-authored by all seven members of the City Council, drew praise from labor leaders and worker advocates as a step toward more robust, efficient protections for people working in the capital city.

Construction and service-industry unions, in particular, pushed city officials to add wage theft to the scope of its labor enforcement work.

At a public hearing on the ordinance in October, Carpenters Local 322 member Saben De Smet called wage theft a “competing business model” for too many developers and non-union contractors in his industry.

“Here in Minnesota, a construction contractor using a wage-theft model can underbid other contractors – whether union or non-union – by up to 20%,” De Smet told council members. “This is because they avoid paying worker compensation, unemployment insurance and other costs associated with being above board.

“This is both a leveling of the playing field and a human-rights issue for us.”

Wage theft has come under increased public scrutiny in recent years, after a 2014 report by the Economic Policy Institute estimated that it costs U.S. workers more than $50 billion annually. In Ramsey and Hennepin counties alone, construction workers lose $3 million to wage theft each year, according to a 2022 report authorized by the county attorneys offices.

“If someone was to shoplift or steal a car, you’d expect them to get arrested or get in trouble,” Ironworkers Local 512 member Nick Petrucelle, a co-chair of Minnesota’s Labor Council for Latin American Advancement, told council members. “But employers, they can rip off their employees, they can steal their wages, and it’s really hard to do anything about it.”

St. Paul’s new ordinance largely aligns with state legislation passed in Minnesota five years ago. Hailed at the time as the nation’s toughest wage theft law, it gave state regulators and the Attorney General new powers to investigate wage theft and created stiffer penalties, both civil and criminal.

While St. Paul’s ordinance does not create new requirements for employers, it does complement the city’s unique minimum wage and earned-sick-and-safe-time laws, advocates on the city’s Labor Standards Advisory Committee (LSAC) said.

“City staff should be able to resolve all of these issues together in one package,” LSAC member Rick Varco, political director for SEIU Healthcare Minnesota and Iowa, told council members.

Varco noted that city investigators pursuing a minimum-wage complaint are well positioned to identify other forms of wage theft, too. But without an ordinance on the books, the city must turn the matter over to state regulators.

“This is better for workers who don’t have to navigate one more bureaucratic maze,” he said. “It is better for employers, especially those who fail through ignorance or capacity issues, to have one stop that can get them back on the right track.”

The city’s Department of Human Rights and Equal Economic Opportunity (HREEO) will begin handling wage theft complaints when the new ordinance takes effect Jan. 1.

Wage theft occurs any time employers fail to pay wages employees are legally entitled to, including paying below minimum wage, not paying overtime, requiring work without pay, denying legal breaks, misclassification, withholding tips, failing to pay fringe benefits and making illegal payroll deductions.

“Wage theft is one of the largest types of theft in our country and is a pervasive and systemic problem throughout Minnesota,” St. Paul Regional Labor Federation President Kera Peterson said. “It affects workers in all sectors of our economy. This ordinance helps to make workers in Saint Paul more secure and helps level the playing field for employers who are following our state laws and local ordinances.”

– Michael Moore, Union Advocate editor

Filed Under: Labor Voices, Politics Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Workers call out ‘anti-union activities’ at Minnesota nursing homes

October 23, 2024 by

Union and non-union nursing home workers rallied outside Monarch’s offices as representatives sought a meeting with executives inside.

As Minnesota nursing homes continue to draw scrutiny for low wages, high turnover and staffing shortfalls, members of the state’s largest health care union are calling on one of the state’s largest nursing home companies to join them in working toward a solution.

SEIU Healthcare Minnesota and Iowa, which represents over 50,000 health care workers, staged an hourlong rally Sept. 27 outside Monarch Healthcare Management’s corporate offices in Eagan, bringing together over 100 union and non-union nursing home workers and community supporters.

Two workers entered Monarch’s offices and briefly met with an executive to relay the group’s demands.

“We told him that we are fed up with working short every day, day in and day out, in these nursing homes,” Isaac Sant said. “It’s not safe for us as workers; it’s not safe for our residents. Things have got to change.”

Conditions are poised to change in the state’s nursing home industry, thanks to the work of a new Workforce Standards Board, authorized by DFL legislative majorities last year.

The board recently took the first steps toward setting a $20.50 minimum wage in all nursing homes, with higher rates for positions like LPNs and CNAs. The board also voted to require that nursing home workers receive time-and-a-half pay on all 11 state holidays.

But employer representatives on the board did not support the higher standards. And as the state’s rulemaking process grinds on, conditions inside nursing homes remain challenging for both staff and residents, workers at the rally said.

Bolanle Adedeji, who is training to work at a Monarch facility, said short staffing often prevents nursing home workers from offering the personalized care they want to give.

“At times, they want to share their minds, they want to talk with you, they want to relate to you,” she said. “But because of time constraints, you cannot let them. Some of them are weeping, some of them are crying that we are not there for them. So this short staffing has to stop now.”

One way to bring change, workers at the rally said, is by organizing a union. But SEIU representatives said Monarch is notorious for “anti-union activities” in its non-union facilities where workers show an interest in bargaining for better wages, benefits and staffing.

“The boss has the message that we’re here, and enough is enough with the short staffing, low pay and poor working conditions,” said Isaac Ngafua, who works at an assisted living facility in Brooklyn Center.

– Michael Moore, Union Advocate editor

Filed Under: Organizing Tagged With: , , ,

New state board sets $20.50 wage floor in nursing home industry

June 10, 2024 by

SEIU member Nessa Higgins spoke during a press conference at the Minnesota Department of Labor and Industry, as (L to R) Teresa Brees, T.J. Hart, Michelle Armstrong and Labor Commissioner Nicole Blissenbach looked on.

Thousands of nursing home workers across Minnesota are likely to see their pay dramatically increase over the next three years after the state’s new board to oversee workforce standards in the industry authorized a $20.50 minimum wage April 29.

The new wage floor will phase in over the next three years, with higher minimums for certified nursing assistants ($24 per hour), trained medication aides ($25) and licensed practical nurses ($28.50).

DFL state lawmakers passed a bill last year establishing the Nursing Home Standards Board, the first of its kind in the U.S. It was a top political priority for three unions representing nursing home workers: SEIU Healthcare Minnesota and Iowa, the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) and the United Steelworkers.

At a press conference following the board’s vote, workers praised the new standards as historic. Some became emotional in discussing the implications for themselves, their fellow workers and nursing home residents across Minnesota, where the industry has seen some of the worst staffing shortfalls in the nation.

“I have been doing this work for most of my lifetime, and I have seen the consistency of staff drop over time,” said Michelle Armstrong, a nurse and member of Local 1189 who served on the standards board. “We’ve lost the continuity of care, which hurts workers and residents.

“We need to do everything we can to change things, and today, I hope, is a big step forward.”

Nessa Higgins, who works at the Estates of Chateau in south Minneapolis, said that over her 25-year career, she has watched executives increase their own pay while struggling to attract and retain workers to frontline jobs. She said some of her co-workers now work multiple nursing-home jobs to make ends meet for their families.

“When that wage goes up, that’s them spending more time with their families because they don’t have to work two or three jobs,” she said. “We give everything that we’ve got, and it never trickles down to us – it just stops with the higher-ups.”

“I make $17.68 an hour, and I’ve been working at this facility for seven years,” Roseville Estates laundry worker Teresa Brees, an SEIU member, said. “That’s all I make. Thankfully, the Standards Board, (when the wage floor begins phasing in) will see that at least I get above $19. That’s really important to me.”

In addition to the wage floor, the new board also mandated that nursing home workers receive time-and-a-half pay on all 11 state holidays – a move T.J. Hart, who works in food service at a non-union nursing home, described as a matter of fairness.

“Long-term-care facilities are 24-7 facilities, and it’s not management who’s working on holidays,” Hart said. “We are the ones that are working on holidays and taking time away from our families and friends while we’re serving our residents.”

Higgins, an SEIU member, said she has struggled with the question of whether to leave her current position for a higher-paying job – a choice she hopes she won’t have to make now, with the new standards poised to take effect.

“Some of my best friends are residents at that nursing home,” Higgins said. “I’m there every day. I know I look forward to seeing them, and they look forward to seeing me. I want to stay right there with the family that I have been with.”

The nine-member board approved the higher standards with three worker representatives and three government representatives voting yes, while three employer representatives abstained.

Rasha Ahmad Sharif, a vice president of SEIU Healthcare Minnesota and leader of its long-term care sector, called the board’s vote a “revolutionary moment seeing nursing home workers – union and non-union alike – standing up and demanding change.”

“We stand by and support this board and are excited for these new standards,” Ahmad Sharif added. “We still have a lot of work to do, but this is an amazing step forward for nursing home workers and residents all across Minnesota.”

– Michael Moore, Union Advocate editor

Filed Under: Community, Union Events Tagged With: , , , , ,

Nursing home workers plan to strike as new industry standards board ramps up work

February 23, 2024 by

Workers at nursing homes across the Twin Cities are voting to stage a one-day strike March 5 over unfair labor practices, escalating their fight for pay and benefit increases that they say are needed to address staffing shortfalls in their industry.

Two local unions, SEIU Healthcare Minnesota and Iowa and United Food and Commercial Workers Local 663, had announced workers at 10 nursing homes would join the strike when the March edition of The Union Advocate went to press. Leaders said strike-authorization votes at other facilities were still in the works.

At a press conference Feb. 20 outside Saint Therese in New Hope, nursing assistant Monyou Taye said she voted to strike because “workers and our residents deserve better.”

“We don’t have enough staff and equipment to keep up with the work,” Taye said. “Over the years we have had to do more and more … because not enough people want to do this important work under the current wages and benefits.

“It makes us feel burned out and stressed. It makes us feel angry.”

In her 15th year working at Saint Therese, Taye still earns less than $20 per hour, and a survey of 1,300 Minnesota nursing home workers conducted by SEIU last fall suggests she’s not alone. Half reported making less than $20 per hour, 80% said they make less than $25 per hour and nine out of 10 said they struggle to afford basic needs.

A strike is sure to draw the attention of Minnesota’s new Nursing Home Workforce Standards Board, which began meeting last fall and is tasked with setting minimum employment standards in the industry.

The board, established by state lawmakers last year, is ramping up its work, and dozens of union members turned out for its first in-person meeting Feb. 21 in Brooklyn Park.

SEIU Healthcare members voted last year to push for a $25 wage floor in the industry, plus affordable health and retirement benefits.

“We know that these changes are possible, and we know that without them we are going to continue the staffing crisis that plagues the nursing home industry,” Jamie Gulley, the union’s president, said outside Saint Therese. “Workers are fed up, and that’s why we’re standing up and saying enough is enough. We are ready to strike.”

At press time, two nursing homes in the east metro, Cerenity in St. Paul and the Estates of Roseville, were among the locations where workers planned to strike March 5.

Teresa Brees, a Roseville worker with 25 years of experience in the industry, tore a tendon in her bicep after working 23 straight days last year. She and other long-term care workers “are at our breaking points,” she said, due to short staffing, and it won’t get better without better pay and benefits.

“How many more good people will we lose because of the low pay, lack of benefits and ongoing disrespect?” she said.

Filed Under: Organizing, Union Events Tagged With: , , , , ,

MN workers win union elections at nonprofit law firm, Fairview hospital, ADT and recycling startup

February 23, 2024 by

(Teamsters Local 120 photo)

Recycling, security and health care workers in the Twin Cities voted to form unions recently in separate elections overseen by the National Labor Relations Board, as workers continued to show interest in joining together to bargain for better wages, benefits and working conditions.

And on Wednesday the NLRB tallied votes in a mail-in organizing election covering 130 workers at Mid-Minnesota Legal Aid, who voted 70 to 25 in favor of bargaining collectively as members of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) Council 5.

Based in Minneapolis, MMLA is the state’s largest nonprofit law firm, and its employees are forming a “wall-to-wall” union of workers from across the state.

Management has challenged the eligibility of certain professional employees – including assistant supervising attorneys and managing attorneys – to participate in the bargaining unit with members of other job classifications, like paralegals, legal assistants, advocates and support staff. The NLRB has not yet issued a ruling, but it will not impact the election results.

“From the outset, these workers have made their priorities clear – they are committed to putting their colleagues, clients, and communities at the forefront of their mission to come together and form a union,” Council 5 said in a statement. “Their dedication to solidarity and community exemplifies the true spirit of unionism.”

In other local union elections:

• Health unit coordinators at M Health Fairview Riverside Hospital voted to join SEIU Healthcare Minnesota and Iowa on Feb. 13, with 77% of participating workers voting yes.

The new bargaining unit of 32 employees joins over 1,500 area health care workers who have joined the SEIU local since 2021. Two other groups of workers – at Children’s Hospital in Minneapolis and Unity Hospital in Fridley – have also filed for elections with the union.

• Twin Cities-based security technicians with ADT voted 14-4 in favor of forming a union with Communications Workers of America Local 7250 in an election held Feb. 16. The bargaining unit brings together 22 tech engineers, classic technicians and service technicians.

• Workers at Ridwell, a recycling startup with a branch based in St. Paul, voted unanimously to unionize Jan. 30. The company’s seven drivers and warehouse workers in Minnesota will join Teamsters Local 120.

Jamie Hoekstera, a Ridwell driver, said workers hope to bargain a first contract that addresses their concerns over wages, benefits and working conditions.

“My coworkers and I voted to become Teamsters so that we can gain a voice in our workplace,” Hoekstera said. “I am excited to work under a strong union contract that will give me a say in the decisions that affect my career and future.”

The St. Paul unit is the third group of Ridwell workers in the U.S. to join the Teamsters.

Ridwell’s services include reusing and disposing of hard-to-recycle items like batteries, lightbulbs and plastic film. Since its founding in 2018, Ridwell has expanded from Washington state to California, Colorado, Minnesota, Oregon and Texas.

“We look forward to helping this new group of Teamster workers negotiate a strong contract that reflects the critical work they provide to their communities,” Local 120 President Tom Erickson said.

Filed Under: Organizing Tagged With: , , , , ,

Union approves first contract at Planned Parenthood North Central States

January 19, 2024 by

PPNCS United members held informational picketing in November – a strategy that workers credit with pressuring management to improve its health coverage.

Planned Parenthood North Central States workers in Minnesota and four other states voted to ratify their first union contract this week, capping a tumultuous round of negotiations with the reproductive health organization, where workers voted to unionize in July 2022.

The new contract takes effect retroactively to Jan. 1 and covers about 430 members of PPNCS United, who will see immediate gains in wages and health benefits, according to the union.

The contract establishes a 15-year wage scale and provides raises of 11.75% over three years, including a 4.5% increase in year No. 1. For Planned Parenthood’s lowest-paid employees, a new $19 minimum wage, combined with the first-year wage hike, will mean 17% increase in their pay.

“That’s a huge victory,” said PPNCS triage nurse Nicole Anschutz, who served on the union’s bargaining team. “Some staff who were getting $17 an hour are seeing that increase to almost $20 per hour immediately.”

Union members also won grievance and arbitration rights and a progressive discipline process that requires just cause for terminations – no small victory for a union whose elected leaders alleged that they were targeted and intimidated by management away from the bargaining table.

Anschutz joined the bargaining team after a wave of resignations and firings, prompted by PPNCS management’s move to deliver “final written notices” to all 14 workers elected to represent their union in negotiations. With no grievance or arbitration process in place, union members filed charges of unfair labor practices with the National Labor Relations Board last March – and are still awaiting a decision.

“There were other staff that weren’t a part of the bargaining team that were fired during this process for various reasons too, and we couldn’t fight that,” Anschutz said.

Shay Gingras, a senior research coordinator who served on the union’s bargaining team from the start, noted that the process has played out as PPNCS and its workers face new challenges – and attacks – in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade.

“We’ve lost too many amazing staff members because of issues we have been facing inside and outside of the organization, so I am happy we won protections and other gains to recognize our important work supporting our patients,” Gingras said.

“As an original bargaining team member, I’m so proud of our team who have fought so hard for so long to win these gains. This has been a really long and difficult process and our fight will continue, but I’m really proud of what we were able to win in this first contract.”

Union leaders and PPNCS reached a tentative agreement on the three-year contract in their 37th bargaining session. Among members who participated in the ratification vote, 84% voted to approve the deal.

Nothing came easily at the bargaining table, committee members said, prompting union members to steadily dial up their public pressure on PPNCS leadership to settle a fair contract. Informational picketing in November outside several facilities, including in St. Paul, had an immediate impact, according to Anschutz.

“Prior to the informational picket, the employer had made it very clear we were going to get nothing on health insurance,” she said. “After the informational picket, we started getting things done on health insurance.”

James Willging, a senior community organizer at PPNCS, said health insurance will become more affordable, especially for workers with children and families, under the new contract.

“This contract gives frontline staff more stability so we can focus on the critical work we do every day,” Willging said. “We hope this will help address our staffing shortage so we can provide the compassionate and kind care our patients deserve.”

Although they celebrated their first contract, Anschutz and other union leaders were quick to note that their union’s efforts in support of workers’ rights and abortion rights is not done.

“It seemed impossible at times, like it was never going to happen,” Anschutz said. “I didn’t expect to cry as much as I did in the whole process. But it’s worth it to have the protections we have now and this foundation that we can build upon in the future.”

PPNCS United is an affiliate of SEIU Healthcare Minnesota and Iowa.

Filed Under: Community, Organizing, Union Events Tagged With: , , , , , ,
«Previous Page
Next Page»