by James Parks, Oct 15, 2007

Nurses at five Bay Area hospitals were locked out when they tried to return to work Oct. 12, after a two-day strike. Nearly 5,000 registered nurses—members of the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee (CNA/NNOC)—took a stand for improving patient care in the two-day strike at 15 Northern California hospitals. All but two of the hospitals are part of the giant Sutter Health chain and include some of the largest hospitals in the San Francisco Bay Area. 

Locked out are nurses at Sutter’s Alta Bates Summit Medical Center’s facilities in Oakland and Berkeley; Eden Medical Center in Castro Valley; San Leandro Hospital; Sutter Solano Medical Center in Vallejo; and Fremont Medical Center in Yuba City, northeast of Sacramento.

The nurses walked out after the hospitals presented their last and final contract offer, which did not address the nurses’ main concerns. The nurses say the Sutter affiliates provide inadequate staffing, particularly to cover nurses during breaks and during their meals. They also say they have been unable to negotiate language with Sutter on safety issues, such as reducing injuries that can occur when they lift patients, and have not come to agreement on health care and pension benefits.

Zenei Cortez, a member of CNA/NNOC’s Council of Presidents, says:

For a corporation that pretends it respects and values its RNs, the lockout sends a very different, shameful message of retaliation. It’s an insult not only to the nurses, but also to the patients who deserve access to their experienced, qualified RNs.

Several of the hospitals said they signed contracts of two to five days with temporary staffing services for replacement nurses. Before the strike began Oct. 10, management was recruiting replacement nurses from as far away as Ohio. One flier, sent to nurses in Ohio and obtained by CNA/NNOC, offered “up to $90” per hour, airfare or other transportation to the Bay Area and stays in

luxury accommodations in San Francisco. Minutes from the San Francisco shopping centers and downtown attractions. You are driven to the hospital from your luxury hotel.

In a statement, CNA/NNOC said the lockout is particularly disturbing given the potential danger to public health posed by Sutter’s failure to assure that the strike nurses have legal competency validation as required by state law. Under California hospital licensing laws and state regulations, registered nurses must have demonstrated current competency before being given or accepting direct patient care assignments. Sutter has failed to meet that test, the union says.

The union says no additional negotiations are scheduled, and future strikes remain an option.

Bonnie Castillo, the union’s Sutter division director, puts it this way:

Our first priority is to resolve the patient care problems and negotiate fair contracts, but Sutter has to end its intransigence and hard line stance. Telling the RNs to take it or leave it does not show a desire by Sutter to resolve our differences and end this dispute.

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