"UC has made continuous efforts to reach agreement with CNA in the past six months of bargaining," said Howard Pripas, UC's executive director of labor relations. "We value our nurses and the role they play in providing excellent patient care, and we put forth proposals that reflected our appreciation for their work. We are hopeful that bringing in an independent mediator will help us resolve any remaining issues."
Once the Public Employment Relations Board certifies that the negotiations are at an impasse, mediation will begin as soon as possible. The University intends to work hard to resolve the impasse. During the 31 bargaining sessions, UC has proposed:
• Market-competitive wages for nurses.
UC offered market-based salary increases for nurses at each of its five major medical centers and 10 student health clinics. UC presented CNA with salary information from published salary surveys conducted by third-party consultants that showed UC either leads or is at the market average for RN wages in most locations.
• The same high quality health care benefits enjoyed by all UC employees.
UC proposed that nurses receive the same health care benefits provided to all University employees. These benefits provide a number of health care plans at affordable cost to employees. In fact, employees in some plans will see a decrease in costs from 2007.
• No substantive changes in the retirement program.
UC guaranteed that nurses will not have to make contributions to the University's excellent retirement system through September 2008, and again agreed that the University will not make substantive changes to the system.
• A flexible program for Paid Time Off (PTO).
The University's proposal would allow nurses to take more days as scheduled vacation than the current program, providing nurses greater flexibility with their time. Six days of sick leave are put into this bank each year, along with all vacation accrual days; if the six single-day instances of sick leave are not used by the nurse, they remain in the PTO bank for future use as either sick leave or vacation leave. Nurses who use more than six instances of single-day sick leave a year or who have illness of more than 24 work hours would have access to short-term leave for illnesses. Current nurses will be able to choose to remain in the current sick/vacation program or enroll in PTO.
Realizing that the parties remained far apart on a number of issues, on Tuesday (Oct. 16), UC proposed that both parties return to current contract language on all issues except wage increases, benefits and parking, in an effort to ensure that nurses receive the proposed wage increases in October. This proposal was not accepted by the union, and the University formally proposed a package that includes a number of offers that address CNA issues. CNA rejected this package, and agreed that the parties are at impasse.
As has been reported in the news recently, CNA has called strikes at several non-UC hospitals in California. UC has stated that any strikes before the completion of the entire bargaining process, including mediation and fact-finding with a state-appointed neutral third party, are presumptively illegal. In fact, CNA was legally barred by court order from conducting such a strike against UC hospitals during 2005 contract negotiations, and the Public Employment Relations Board, the state agency governing public sector labor matters, also issued a complaint against CNA. A final ruling on this matter is expected soon. (Note: the decision will be made by a PERB administrative law judge and not by a court.)
Even though UC was successful in restraining the union from striking in 2005, the strike threat alone cost the University medical centers a total of approximately $9 million in emergency arrangements (e.g., contracting for temporary additional staffing and other emergency operational provisions).
There are more than 8,800 nurses in the UC medical system.
####
For more news and information about UC nurses and their contributions to the community and the University: http://www.ucnurses.com