SEIU Launches Ad Campaign Over Stalled Talks
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NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — On the heels of Northern Berkshire Healthcare's full-page ad last week soliciting community support in contract negotiations, health-care workers are launching their own campaign to inform the public of their side.
In radio and print ads, the local chapter of 1199SEIU (Service Employees International Union) is advertising the concessions union members say have been offered to the financially struggling health-care system.
"To do our part, 1199SEIU members have volunteered to freeze our wages, to give up overtime pay, and to make other changes to help make our hospital more efficient," reads the advertisement which began airing Friday on local radio stations.
Hospital officials, however, reacted sharply to the union's "expensive ad campaign," stating the advertisements aren't telling the whole story.
"We are committed to resolving differences at the bargaining table but feel it is necessary to respond to the misrepresentations and distortions put forth by 1199SEIU," said a statement released by NBH officials.
SEIU voted last week to strike if talks for new two-year contract fail. The union covers 174 workers in departments ranging from housekeeping to nursing at North Adams Regional Hospital, a subsidiary of Northern Berkshire Healthcare. They have been operating without a contract since Sept. 30.
"The members who've worked here and lived in the community for many years — and who are your neighbors, family, and friends — are doing everything we can to help the hospital and still be able to provide for our families and take care of our patients," said NARH employee and union chapter Chairman Michael O'Brien. "We feel that the concessions we have put on the table will help management over the next two years to weather the economic storm that we've all had to face."
The union says it's put forward a proposal well within the hospital's fiscal goal. Hospital officials say the proposal doesn't freeze wages or provide real relief through overtime changes, said NBH officials in a statement.
"It is a well-known fact that some union employees have earned as much or more in overtime pay than the average annual income for the North Adams area of $36,452," according to the hospital statement. Concessions offered so far "do not meet critical goals" in addressing the hospital's deficit.
"We are hopeful we can come to a resolution that is mutually agreeable, but are resolved to seek a contract that ensures stability for North Adams Regional Hospital," hospital officials have said.
SEIU says it has filed an unfair labor practice against NBH last week after the hospital changed wage and overtime demands for a third time.
The union's also made a point of stating that NBH President Richard Palmisano hasn't been involved with the ongoing talks and, instead, an outside consultant has been leading negotiations. Palmisano, however, responded that Michael Shuey of the Weissman Group is qualified for contracts talks — as are the experts SEIU has brought in.
"Fortunately, as the person running the hospital, I know that I can't do surgery. The same is true of negotiations," said Palmisano. "I am an expert at running a hospital. Mr. Shuey is an expert at negotiations — as is Mr. [Michael] Fadel, the New York- and Boston-based executive vice president of 1199SEIU."
Hospital officials also said the characterizations that the health-care system's lost money under Palmisano is unfair, noting it made gains the first two years of his tenure. The global recession, reductions in government reimbursement rates and "wages and benefits for local workers that exceed those of other similar hospitals" are responsible for the current deficit, they say.
In the meantime, an unfair labor complaint brought against SEIU by the hospital will be heard by a National Labor Board administrative judge in March. The hospital charged that the union falsely told members that they were required to pay dues to 1199SEIU; the NLRB's regional director in Boston determined that the union "... has been restraining and coercing [North Adams Regional Hospital] employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed in Section 7 of the [National Labor Relations Act] ..."
The director determined that, despite the absence of contract language requiring the payment of dues, a union delegate "by memorandum to employees, impliedly threatened employees with discharge if they failed to obtain Union membership or otherwise contributed financial support" to 1199SEIU.
The finding was reportedly released on Nov. 30 but is not yet available online.
SEIU is set to strike Saturday morning if a contract is not reached. The hospital says it's prepared to keep operating in that event.
Editor: Comment about publications taken out because it was just too darn snarky.
