Our Respiratory Therapists at Kaiser Permanente have been fighting to fix their short staffing crisis by getting market adjustments to address the historically low wages. On October 29th, a number of RTs along with leaders and stewards in the Tech unit met with Human Resources to read a letter and make their demands clear: we need to bring RT wages up to those in other areas covered by the Alliance agreement that have similar costs of living. After telling these members that they would return with a response, Kaiser said it had "no interest" in bargaining over these wages. This answer is unacceptable and these RTs intend to do what is necessary to win justice for their unit.
Below is the letter that was read to Kaiser HR, and you can watch the video here.
For the last several years, KPNW has struggled to recruit and retain experienced and qualified respiratory therapists. Many positions have been chronically vacant, which has led to understaffing, burnout, moral injury, and some of the highest rates of overtime in the NW region.
The root cause of KPNW’s inability to recruit skilled RTs is the well-below-market wage being offered. Potential candidates have refused job offers when they learn how much they would be making. In fact, much of the current RT staff have taken on-call or coded positions at other metro area hospitals that are paying fair wages. The result is an overall loss of experienced, highly-skilled bedside therapists providing their essential services to the KP members who need them most.
For at least the last 18 months, KPNW respiratory therapists have made numerous, ongoing attempts to work in good faith and partnership with management to correct this problem, but have been met with bureaucratic stall tactics, gaslighting, and inaction. Again and again, we have provided ample evidence to show that KPNW wages for RTs have not kept pace with the local market. And most recently, we’ve shown that KPNW RTs are paid at least 40% less than KP RTs working at Roseville Medical Center outside of Sacramento; RTs doing the same job at a similar-sized hospital, in a metro area with nearly identical cost of living, for the same organization should be compensated equally.
There is an unambiguous, cause-and-effect relationship between unfair, below-market pay for KPNW RTs and downstream effects including understaffing, burnout, and loss of skilled bedside therapists. But despite clear evidence and an obvious solution, Adam Van Den Avyle has repeatedly denied requests to review and adjust RT wages.
If KPNW continues to ignore and deprioritize this issue, it will be KP members who suffer as experienced and highly-skilled RTs provide their services elsewhere. Those who have signed this petition all agree that this is not acceptable. KPNW RTs deserve fair, competitive wages, and KP management needs to take the issue seriously to arrive at a resolution in a timely fashion.
We ask that management stop their disrespectful, passive-aggressive avoidance of this urgent problem. We expect management to have the courage to practice what they preach and hold up their end of this partnership. RTs can’t ignore a problem because it’s difficult or uncomfortable to solve — we do what we must because it’s best for our patients, not because it’s easy, and we’re going to hold management to the same standard. KPNW knows that RT wages are well below what’s fair and we expect management to act with the same integrity they demand from us to solve this. Meet us at the table to discuss our wages and let’s work together to solve the root cause of these ongoing problems. Don’t continue to ignore, delay, and brush aside this problem thinking it’ll go away — because it won’t. It’ll get worse.