Chino Bargaining: Progress Made on Economic Proposals

February 2013

Chino Bargaining Update: February 25, 2013

Finally! Despite management’s refusal to meet with the Federal Mediator last week, we made some progress on our economic proposal. After the previous week’s bargaining session with the Federal government Mediator, and the tremendous support of nurses from all the various departments who showed up at bargaining, both parties offered proposals on Friday that begin to address the key concerns that have been expressed during months of bargaining.

Union Proposal:

The RN bargaining team proposed that all Registered Nurses whose current wage rate is below the new wage grid that management is proposing for new hires, be brought up to at least the same wage rates as management intends to give to new hires—for comparable RN experience. In addition, we gave a new proposal for guaranteed wage increases combined with the ability of management to continue merit increases as well.

Management Proposal:

Management counter proposed to increase wages for only a small portion of nurses (approximately 45 RNs), who according to management’s proposal would get the “new grad” wage rate regardless of how long they’ve worked at Chino.

For all the other nurses, management proposed only a 1% increase in wages and “potential” merit. This proposal would leave the majority of the nurses behind newly-hired nurses who have the same experience. Management also proposed a new wage grid that eliminated the wage rates for any RN with more than 5 years experience.

Both the Union and management made other proposed changes in the economic proposal that brought us closer together on other issues.

Please see the comparison between the two proposals below:

Next Steps

We will be providing you with additional information and reaching out to you about next steps. We will keep you posted and as soon as we know our next bargaining date we will let you know.

After last week’s great support from our nurses who came to bargaining, it is even more imperative for additional nurses to come to all future negotiations.

Meanwhile, each week RNs are leaving Chino for better paying jobs at other area hospitals. We sincerely hope that management sees the impact this massive turnover rate is having on patients in our community, and that they realize a fair wage increase for current and loyal Chino RNs would mean better employee retention and improved patient care.