November 7, 2011 -- Our Union is working with the Staffing Committee on the issue of the charge RN/RRT being an all-in-one position with the charge RN having to leave the unit for hours at at a time, leaving the unit without a charge and no one to give RNs a break. The hospital has committed to providing a resource nurse whose responsibilities will be to respond to RRTs, among other nursing duties.

We began interest-based negotiations with the hospital regarding Clinical Ladder in October. This process has been going very well and one that we just may accomplish before the end of the year.

A grievance was filed over In-house Registry nurses who were not paid correctly. The hospital ran an audit and found that 20 RNs had not been paid properly. All 20 received a check for the amounts owed to them in June.

Grievances:

1)      Our Union helped change one discipline from a Final Written to a Written for lack of documentation and patient complaints.

2)      An RN lost a patient and was given a two-day suspension. Our Union’s grievance was denied by the hospital (step 1 & step 2).

3)      A grievance has been filed over an RN receiving a written warning for rudeness and unprofessional conduct.

4)      A grievance has been filed over an RN who was suspended due to a patient’s complaint of harassment.

December 9th – Labor Management Committee Meeting from 11 a.m. to noon in classroom 3.