Dissension clouds push for RN super union

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/stories/2009/09/07/daily78.html

Friday, September 11, 2009, 10:25am PDT - by Chris Rauber

Three nursing organizations hoping to form a 150,000-member National Nurses United union said Thursday that delegates representing one of three — the Oakland-based California Nurses Association — “voted unanimously” Sept. 10 to endorse and join the proposed “super union” for RNs.

The vote took place at the CNA/National Nurses Organizing Committee biennial convention in San Francisco, CNA officials reported in a Sept. 10 statement.

The California-based union represents about 86,000 RNs nationwide, most of them in the Golden State.

The other unions, the Massachusetts Nurses Association and United American Nurses, which represents about 41,000 RNs in a host of states, are expected to hold votes on the proposal, followed by a Dec. 7-8 founding convention for the NNU in Scottsdale, Ariz.

But some representatives of the Massachusetts union continue to insist they want nothing to do with the proposed combination, which they say is being forced upon them by union leaders.

Barbara Norton, a Region 5 regional director of the Massachusetts Nurses Association and chair of Brigham & Women’s Hospital’s MNA bargaining unit, said the “overwhelming majority” of the 3,000 nurses in the hospital’s bargaining unit don’t want to join forces with the other unions.

FULL story at link.