Kaiser's biggest union, representing 57,000 California workers, ratifies four-year contract
Roughly 57,000 Kaiser Permanente workers, all working in California, ratified a four-year labor contract agreement that protects certain jobs from outsourcing and creates a program that aims to diminish a national shortage of health care workers, union leaders announced Wednesday.
“Our new contract recognizes the skill and dedication we bring to our work, and the guaranteed raises and protected benefits give us the peace of mind to focus on caring for our patients,” said Jessica Rodriguez, an emergency department technician at Kaiser Permanente in Oakland. “We are also proud to have negotiated an agreement that is focused on the future and making sure patients have access to highly skilled and trained caregivers in the years to come.”
Rodriguez is a member of Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West. SEIU and two other international labor groups — the Office and Professional Employees International Union and the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers — have 83,000 members in the Coalition of Kaiser Permanente Unions.
SEIU-UHW is the largest of the 11 local union chapters in the coalition, and its members work throughout California. The coalition also has members in Colorado, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Maryland, Oregon, Virginia and Washington. All are voting on the same agreement. Depending on the union local, ballots will be collected as late as Oct. 30, but most voting will conclude by Saturday.
Read more: https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/health-and-medicine/article236326003.html
(Sacramento Bee)
