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Tri-City Board Approves Nurses Union

Posted on: Friday, 16 December 2005, 21:00 CST

By Paul Sisson, North County Times, Escondido, Calif.

Dec. 16--OCEANSIDE ---- It's official: Tri-City Medical Center's 609 registered nurses are now unionized.

By a unanimous vote Thursday, Tri-City Healthcare District's board of directors recognized the California Nurses Association as the official bargaining unit for all registered nurses at the 397-bed public hospital that serves Oceanside, Vista and Carlsbad.

Board Director Ron Mitchell welcomed the union to Tri-City, adding that joining the association would help increase the hospital's level of patient care.

"It's about improving the quality of the care that we provide at this hospital, that's what we're all here for," Mitchell said.

Nurses at Tri-City are the last in North County to unionize. A state law called the Meyers-Millias-Brown Act allows public employees to form a union if more than 50 percent sign special cards indicating they wish to join.

Roy Hong, a spokesman for the nurses association, said Thursday night that it will take about one year for the hospital and the union to hammer out their first contract.

According to their own internal policy, Tri-City's board of directors had to maintain a position of neutrality regarding whether nurses should form a collective bargaining unit.

Director David Tweedy said Thursday that he personally thought joining a union was unnecessary. He said he thought the hospital's human resources staff did an exemplary job of providing a fair working environment for all nurses. However, he said he would accept the decision of the majority with no reservations.

"I welcome them, and I am glad that they are here," Tweedy said.

According to hospital administrators, nurses who work at Tri-City already have their salaries adjusted to reflect wages at other comparable unionized hospitals. A tally of all union cards counted by an independent administrator showed that 324 of Tri-City's 609 nurses voted to join the union, bringing the total to 53 percent.

Hong said that the figure does not necessarily mean that only a little more than half of Tri-City's nurses wished to join the association. He said that the hospital's own collective bargaining policy directed him to quit gathering signatures once he had gotten a few percentage points over 50 percent.

"There was, I believe, much more support out there," Hong said.

Nurses are not the only workers seeking to unionize at Tri-City.

Some 400 hospital workers, including certified nurses assistants, acute-care technicians, janitors, dietary workers, clerks and secretaries have also filed a petition with the hospital declaring their intent to join Local 2028 of the Service Employees International Union.

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To see more of the North County Times, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.nctimes.com.

Copyright (c) 2005, North County Times, Escondido, Calif.

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

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Source: North County Times

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