Management caught paying for staff to campaign for SEIU in government-supervised union election for 44,000 employees

Oakland, Calif.—Nine healthcare workers have filed a federal lawsuit against their employer, Kaiser Permanente, for allegedly providing criminal financial support to SEIU. SEIU is the union that Kaiser employees seek to replace in an upcoming election supervised by the federal government.

Under federal law, employers like Kaiser are prohibited from providing financial support to the unions that represent their employees, in order to ensure that unions act in the interest of their members and not on behalf of the employer. Violating this law is a criminal offense.

Kaiser employees’ lawsuit, filed in United States District Court for the Northern District of California, alleges that Kaiser violated the Labor Management Relations Act by paying for dozens of Kaiser employees to conduct full-time election campaigning on behalf of SEIU.

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Despite 2003 shooting, management refuses to take basic steps to protect employees from outsider who threatened their lives

Baldwin Park, Calif.—Workers at Kaiser’s Baldwin Park Medical Center filed complaints with state and federal agencies today, asking for help after Kaiser management failed to ensure the safety of workers and patients in response to death threats by a former employee.

On July 16, the Los Angeles Superior Court issued a restraining order against Tiffany Ford, 47, for making death threats against two Kaiser employees in the hospital cafeteria. Despite the court’s order, Kaiser officials have allowed Ford full access to the hospital where she threatened employees, citing a prior agreement with Ford’s employer, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU).

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95% of SEIU’s workplace leaders switch sides in anticipation of statewide election Sept. 13

Santa Rosa, Calif.—Forty-eight SEIU union stewards at Kaiser Santa Rosa—virtually the entire SEIU Steward Council—announced yesterday that they endorse NUHW in the Sept.13 statewide election for nearly 44,000 Kaiser Permanente workers to switch from SEIU to NUHW.

“We are confident that the best future for our co-workers is with NUHW and not SEIU-UHW,” the 48 Kaiser employees wrote in a letter to their colleagues. “We look forward to voting for NUHW, so we can be part of a union where we make the decisions about our priorities for bargaining and who respresents us on the job and who leads our union.”

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44,000 Kaiser workers win the right to join NUHW and leave SEIU in a mail ballot election starting Sept. 13

SAN FRANCISCO—The National Labor Relations Board has scheduled a government-protected mail ballot election beginning Sept. 13 for nearly 44,000 Kaiser Permanente workers to join the National Union of Healthcare Workers and kick out the incumbent union SEIU. For the thousands of Kaiser workers who began petitioning the labor board to join NUHW more than 17 months ago, victory is finally in sight.

“We’re voting NUHW to protect our raises and benefits, and get our union back under the control of the members,” said Yolanda Chavez, a senior licensed vocational nurse at Kaiser Oakland for 20 years. “We need a stronger voice at work, and a union that will tell us what’s really going on.”

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Hundreds march in informational picket to improve care at Kaiser’s biggest So. Cal. hospital

LOS ANGELES—Hundreds of registered nurses at Kaiser Los Angeles Medical Center marched outside the hospital today to share their growing concerns over patient and RN safety at Kaiser Permanente’s flagship Southern California facility.

“We want to make our hospital safer for patients and safer for RNs,” said Leila Valdivia, a registered nurse in ICU for 25 years. “Nurses need a stronger voice in determining safe staffing levels and safe working conditions so that every patient can get the quality of care they deserve.”

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Victory at Providence Tarzana after ballot count delayed by defeated incumbent union

LOS ANGELES —The National Labor Relations Board has thrown out objections by the now-ousted SEIU, and counted the ballots of nearly 600 caregivers at Providence Tarzana Medical Center who voted on July 15 to join the National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW).

The count was 282 votes for NUHW to SEIU’s 69. 38 voted to have no union.

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Workers win important victory on terms of election for 44,000 to join NUHW

WASHINGTON, D.C. —On a conference call held Wednesday by the National Labor Relations Board, the National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW) won an agreement that ensures workers’ right to vote by mail in the privacy of their homes, in a government-protected election to join NUHW.

Until Wednesday’s call, the embattled incumbent union SEIU had insisted that all employees should be forced to vote in the workplace, where Kaiser managers and SEIU staff have exclusive access and have worked to prevent voters from hearing both sides. NUHW refused to agree to those terms, and advocated for a protected mail-ballot election. The federal government has agreed to set the date for such an election as early as next week.

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Victory at union’s second Catholic health system also marks beginning of campaign by 13,000 workers at Catholic Healthcare West

Tarzana, Calif.—Nearly 600 caregivers at Providence Tarzana Medical Center voted yesterday in an election to join the National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW) and quit the scandal-stained SEIU.

“We’ve taken back our union,” said Julie Sidrow-Thompson, a monitor tech at the hospital. “For a year and a half, SEIU has stood in our way and left us without a voice. Now that we’re united again in NUHW, we have the strength we need to stand up for our patients and ourselves.”

Providence is the second Catholic hospital system where workers have organized with NUHW, after St. Joseph Health System workers at Santa Rosa Memorial Hospital joined last year. Starting today, the 13,000 caregivers at Catholic Healthcare West—the largest non-profit healthcare provider in California—are collecting signatures to call for their own election to join NUHW once they are eligible to change unions next year.

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The following is a statement from Marie Foster, a 23-year Program Assistant at Kaiser San Jose and a member of NUHW’s Executive Board and Kaiser Organizing Committee, responding to SEIU’s false statements to the media on July 14, 2010:

“NUHW is fighting to secure the fair union elections that thousands of Kaiser workers have been demanding for 16 months, while SEIU is still trying to deny workers the right to vote in three out of four Kaiser bargaining units.

“SEIU’s effort to block these three elections is the reason there is not yet agreement on the details of these elections. NUHW wants a fair, safe, and democratic vote for all Kaiser workers. The fact that SEIU has failed to reach agreement with NUHW on this should come as no surprise. If SEIU is unable to accept a fair agreement that respects the democratic rights of workers, the NLRB will schedule the election.

“In any case, SEIU’s efforts will not stop Kaiser workers from voting for NUHW in a government-supervised election.”

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California labor leaders support petition for 45,000 caregivers to quit SEIU and join NUHW

LOS ANGELES—Thousands of Kaiser healthcare workers fired the first shot today in a long-anticipated battle for independence that will determine the future of California’s largest union, SEIU. They filed a petition that will trigger elections for 45,000 SEIU members to choose between the troubled incumbent and the state’s fastest-growing union, the new National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW).

“We worked for decades to make Kaiser jobs good, stable jobs that paid enough so people in our communities could support their families,” said Robert Hernandez, a materials management clerk at Kaiser Baldwin Park for almost 20 years. “Now since SEIU officials took over our union last year, Kaiser has announced layoffs, cut benefits, and started turning good jobs into contingent or flexed positions. We’re ready to put healthcare workers back in charge of our union again.”

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