News

May 1, 2011

Nurse strike averted by tentative pact

By Jerry Lynott jlynott@timesleader.com
Business Writer
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WILKES-BARRE – Unionized nurses at Wilkes-Barre General Hospital have reached a tentative agreement with management and called off a planned one-day strike that was to begin at 7 a.m. today. 

The Wyoming Valley Nurses Association and the Pennsylvania Association of Staff Nurses and Allied Professionals issued a joint statement with the Wyoming Valley Health Care System around 8:30 p.m. Saturday to announce the progress in their negotiations that have been going on for nearly two years.

“The parties have reached a tentative agreement. The scheduled 24-hour work stoppage notice has been rescinded by the union and no strike or picketing will occur at the hospital,” the release said. “Union members will vote on the ratification of the agreement on Tuesday. No details of the tentative agreement will be released until after the ratification vote on Tuesday.”

Emily Randle, a spokeswoman for the union, and hospital spokesman Jim McGuire confirmed the statement, but declined further comment.

The tentative agreement signaled a possible end to the negotiations that began shortly after the hospital and other assets of the WVHCS were acquired by Community Health Systems Inc. on May 1, 2009 for $271 million. The sale removed the non-profit status of WBGH and it became one of the holdings of for-profit CHS of Franklin, Tenn., the largest publicly traded hospital company in the country.

CHS recognized the union representing more than 400 registered nurses, but not the collective bargaining agreement in place before the sale. The two sides worked out a 60-day labor agreement that lasted until June 30, 2009. However, until the announcement of the tentative agreement they had been unable to come to terms on a new deal.

Since the change in ownership, the union has filed a number of complaints with the National Labor Relations Board, claiming WVHCS has bargained in bad faith. The NLRB set a hearing for June 21 in Philadelphia on the union’s claim that the WVHCS stopped collecting members’ dues in violation of the collective bargaining agreement.

The lack of a new agreement led the union to stage a one-day strike on Dec. 23. Prior to that the nurses went on strike and were locked out in a 15-day labor dispute in 2003.

The hospital brought in replacement nurses in 2003 and was prepared to do the same for the strike that was to take place today.

The pending purchase by CHS of three hospitals in Lackawanna, Luzerne and Wyoming counties from Mercy Health Partners has raised concerns for unionized workers at those facilities.

A Lackawanna County judge approved the $150 million sale in March. In anticipation of the purchase, Mercy Hospital in Scranton announced it would change its name to Regional Hospital of Scranton. Mercy Special Care Hospital in Nanticoke will be called Special Care Hospital and Mercy Tyler Hospital in Tunkhannock will be renamed Tyler Memorial Hospital.

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