Below is a testimony written by Jamie Dawson, a Kaiser Permanente RN who submitted this written testimony in support of our staffing bill, HB 2697. This gives a clear picture of what is happening at the hospital, and why we need safe staffing now.

As a registered nurse, having worked in hospitals in Oregon since 1994, and as a steward in the Oregon Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals, I can testify that hospitals are simply not providing the health care people need--not in terms of access, not in terms of quality or standards of care, not in terms of outcomes for patients. People are

The technical employees at the Mid-Columbia Medical Center in The Dalles, Oregon have voted to approve their first union contract. Negotiations over this contract have lasted several months, after these frontline healthcare workers voted to join the Oregon Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals (OFNHP), Local 5017 of the 1.7 million member American Federation of Teachers, Nurses and Health Professionals (AFT). These workers voted to ratify this contract by an astounding 100%. 

“We are excited that the techs will finally have a voice at Mid-Columbia Medical Center,” says Meggan Erland, an

The Mid-Columbia Medical Center techs have just won a Tentative Agreement on their first union contract since voting to join the Oregon Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals. This ia major step forward for these healthcare workers in their fight for healthcare and workplace justice and in changing the culture at Mid-Columbia.

Now they will need to vote on ratification, to turn the Tentative Agreement into a final Collective Bargaining Agreement. Voting will take place at in-person sessions where you can look at all the details of the new contract and ask any questions you would like

Your MCMC-OFNHP bargaining team would like to announce that we have reached a tentative agreement with the Hospital on our first contract at MCMC!

The parties negotiated diligently with the assistance of the mediator, and your bargaining team worked hard to ensure that our new contract provides a pay scale that encourages our members to stay at MCMC.  We have to keep our experienced staff here as well as be competitive enough to hire new colleagues. This hospital has traditionally been one of the lowest paying hospitals in the area, but this contract will set a wage scale that includes steps

Your bargaining team completed another full day of mediation with MCMC, and we are pleased to report movement was made in our efforts to reach a final agreement.  We are cautiously optimistic we can continue to make progress and recognize that your work away from the table distributing flyers and yard signs, our solidarity displayed at our union meetings, the buttons you are wearing in the workplace, and your voice throughout the community was no doubt a big contributing factor in our progress.  Thank you to those of you who attended the membership meeting; we appreciate your input.  Your

Our bargaining team met with management last week to continue the process of bargaining our contract, and we are also looking forward to Friday, February 10^th, when we return to negotiations.

Because management has been rigid and uncooperative in our bargaining sessions, we have had to go into a formal mediation process to make any progress. We took our first of three mediation sessions to again emphasize to the Hospital our position that we are not second-class employees, and we expect our standards and benefits to be on par with other professional employees within the Hospital. Right now