Rochester General Hospital (RGH) and the Rochester Union of Nurses & Allied Professionals (RUNAP) met today for our tenth bargaining session since negotiations began in October of last year. The session began shortly after 10 AM and ended at approximately 12:30 PM.
Today, RUNAP presented a slide show to provide reasoning for its current wage proposal, and the parties spent time discussing the information presented by the union. RUNAP indicated it is holding to its first wage proposal even though RGH has already offered two counterproposals with increases in wages at the last two negotiation sessions.
During the Session, the Parties Discussed the Following Proposals and Counterproposals from RGH:
- Hours, Overtime, On-Call & Schedules: RGH’s counterproposal specifies the exact hours of the work week, as well as the hours that constitute weekend shifts, for RUNAP-represented nurses. It also details the number and length of breaks employees would receive based on the shift they’re working, the hospital’s policies and pay practices for overtime and on-call, and outlines how schedules will be determined and when those would be posted.
- Attendance and Tardiness: RGH presented a proposal on attendance and tardiness intended to set standards for overall attendance and punctuality in an effort to support safe staffing and help ensure patients continue to receive quality care. RGH’s proposal details what absences are covered by the article, describes when and how employees must provide notice of an unplanned absence, identifies specific definitions for terms related to attendance and tardiness and outlines the processes for discipline related to excessive absenteeism or tardiness.
- Preservation of Benefits: RGH rejected RUNAP’s proposal to preserve any specific/unique benefits that have been established for individual nurses, as it feels it’s important to ensure all benefits provided to RUNAP-represented employees be outlined in the contract so there is no confusion in the future.
- Retirement Benefits: RGH’s counterproposal would guarantee that RUNAP-represented nurses receive the same retirement benefits as all other RGH employees. Also, any changes made to the retirement benefit plans for other RGH employees would automatically apply to RUNAP-represented nurses.
- Agency/Travel Personnel: RGH presented a counterproposal that details when agency personnel would be used by RGH when additional RN staffing is needed. RGH also specified that it would confirm the qualifications of agency personnel to help ensure patients continue to receive quality care.
Unfortunately, RUNAP rejected each of RGH’s proposal and counterproposals, and did not present any new proposals or counterproposals today.
What’s Next
RGH and RUNAP have agreed to work together to schedule the next meeting for bargaining. We will issue another update following that session to keep you informed. You can sign up to receive email or text alerts when a new bargaining update is posted to the website and also submit any questions. Please visit www.RGHNursesMatter.org for more information.