This past week was an eventful, yet ultimately disappointing, national bargaining session. We had representatives from all six of our bargaining units present to hold local bargaining at the national session. Many of you have already received local bargaining updates—there were some gains, but not nearly enough to set Kaiser back on course.
We are continuing forward with our strike authorization vote on September 15th, and we encourage you to sign up to phone bank your coworkers during next week to ensure we have a great vote. Our bargaining teams are uniformly supporting a YES vote. If you haven't already, make sure to fill out your strike pledge.
We also have a letter written by all of our bargaining chairs outlining their own experience at national bargaining, and why they are supporting a YES vote. Click here to read their letter.
Economics
The Economic Subgroup reached no tentative agreements this week. We remain far apart on our core economic priority: restoring wage fairness in light of historic inflation, ongoing staffing challenges, and settlements with other unions that have left us further behind.
Kaiser made a small move on wages. Their new proposal for across-the-board increases is 6.5%, 6.5%, 4.0%, and 3.0%—a total of 20% over four years. This is only a slight change from the 19.5% offer we entered the week with.
Kaiser also made significant movement on tuition reimbursement, proposing to raise the annual reimbursement to $5,000 over the life of the agreement (up from the current $3,000).
Our message remains clear: true partnership depends on fair treatment for our members.
Staffing
The staffing committee met this week and made a joint recommendation on creating tools to measure the effectiveness of implementing the Joint Staffing and Staffing Committee language in the National Agreement—something management did not initially want.
But we hit a major stonewall on the one subject left. How we will work together on scheduling changes, particularly patient scheduling templates? Management called this issue a “non-starter” and refused to engage in problem solving.
As an Alliance, we have made clear that management must commit to early and timely dialogue with us on needed patient scheduling template changes—such as reducing primary care appointments to 20 minutes, double and triple bookings, and the mix of new versus follow-up appointments. Our input is critical if Kaiser truly wants high-quality care, improved patient experience and outcomes, and retention of experienced staff. Management’s refusal to engage is unacceptable.
This is a line in the sand for us. The Alliance bargaining team, chaired in this group by OFNHP Treasurer Joshua Holt, made it clear that a lack of resolution on this issue is a “no deal” for our membership.
We are not letting this go. We will continue the fight for our members, our patients, and their families.
Common Interests
The Common Interest Table—which includes all OFNHP bargaining chairs and Kaiser NW senior leaders—met in Los Angeles this week. The group reached a tentative agreement on a standardized grievance procedure across all six units. This process is designed to move more quickly and requires Kaiser to bring in a new set of managers to hear grievances at Step 2.
Kaiser seems unwilling to solve real problems at the bargaining table and instead appears intent on forcing us to strike. It’s up to us to send the message that we are prepared to do whatever it takes—because we know we are doing it all for our patients.
Now it's time to cast our ballot! You will receive yours Monday morning and all of us, from our CAT to our bargaining chairs, are urging a YES vote. It's time for us to show Kaiser what we are willing to do.