Union says it will act against layoffs

The union representing licensed practical nurses and other laid-off workers at Sacred Heart Medical Center said Monday it will file an unfair labor practice charge against the hospital.

In addition, a dispute over severance pay could lead to a separate grievance.

“They’re offering us a pittance,” said Mary Murdoch, who will lose her job as an LPN after 24 years at the hospital. She would get four weeks of severance pay in the hospital’s offer.

The unfair labor practice charge stems from the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1001’s request for effects bargaining, which the hospital has denied.

The union contends the hospital should negotiate on job retraining and extension of health insurance benefits after announcing layoffs that could affect 160 union members. Case law supports the union’s position, said Dave Fleishman, director of collective bargaining for the local.

The hospital disagrees.

“There really is no unfair labor practice here,” said Roger Chase, attorney for Providence Health Care, which operates the hospital. “There is no obligation to reopen the contract.”

In general, effects bargaining is required when an employer makes a decision affecting union members, said NLRB regional director Richard Ahearn in Seattle.

“The obligation is fairly broad,” he said. “When a decision affects union members there is often an obligation, upon request, to engage in effects bargaining.”

Ahearn said the NLRB has not yet received the union’s charge.

The union highlighted the severance issue at an afternoon news conference on a sidewalk on the hospital campus.

The hospital has offered up to four weeks of severance pay to the laid-off LPNs. The union wants LPNs to get up to six weeks of severance pay. The hospital is, in effect, closing a service by laying off the vast majority of LPNs, according to the union. The contract requires up to six weeks severance if the hospital closes a service.

The hospital announced last week its plans to replace most LPNs with higher-paid registered nurses and lower-paid certified nursing assistants. By the end of October, 88 LPNs will lose their jobs.

The hospital is not closing a service, Chase said. In fact, the contract does not require any severance pay, he said.

Murdoch, the licensed practical nurse with 24 years at the hospital, said LPNs had been promised that they would be phased out by attrition, not by layoffs.

“We feel we have been lied to,” she said.