Seattle Children’s Hospital - We Need an Answer!
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Yesterday, February 1, 2022, our team met with management for our sixth negotiation session. Given that the Hospital has been celebrating the $1.4 billion dollars in donations they recently raised, the over $79 million dollars in federal grants they have received over the pandemic, and dire urgency of the ongoing staffing crisis, we were eager to see management’s response to our massive wage and premium increase proposals from our last session.
Unfortunately, management disappointed us again and didn’t provide us a response on these important issues. We didn’t let this slow us down however, and we came ready with another robust set of proposals on many of the other economic improvements our workplace needs. Our second package covered a range of issues our team has heard our coworkers need addressed, including:
A large retention bonus that would be offered to everyone
The creation of a new vacation cash out procedure which would keep us from losing pay when the hospital denies our time off requests, along with language that would allow each department to modify the vacation request procedure to fit their needs
A significantly higher employer matching percentage for our retirement fund
Language to ensure that when we move up a level in our job title (i.e. ST I to ST II, RT I to RT 2, ect) we keep our years of experience the same, along with a separate agreement that would ensure workers who were left behind in the past are caught back up
Language to make sure that opportunities for advancement in job title are equitably offered
A higher Per Diem Premium
Comprehensive parking language that would make parking on campus cheaper or free in many situations
Expansion of when we can receive overtime pay
Guarantees that the benefits (like our health insurance, retirement fund, parking discounts, etc.) cannot be changed unilaterally by the hospital
And much more
Unlike management (with their extremely weak and wildly inadequate wage proposal) we know that the hospital needs to make huge improvements to our compensation in order recruit and retain the workers needed to get out of this staffing crisis. The economic package we proposed yesterday, combined with our top of the market wage and premium proposals we made in our last session would result in the single biggest set of improvements to our union contract ever and enable us to have the staffing levels we need to give our patients the best care possible.
In our next session on Tuesday, February 8, we plan to propose the last couple of economic proposals; with that everything should officially be on the table. We hope that in this session, management will finally show us they understand the magnitude of the crisis we are in and come ready with serious responses to our economic proposals. We are currently under a contract extension through 2/28/22 but time is running out. Every day that goes by without these improvements we lose more talented coworkers. We can’t wait any longer.
Please join us for our upcoming Contract Action Team meeting tomorrow on Thursday, February 3, where we can discuss our economic proposals in more detail and will talk about what we can do to ensure we secure the wages and other improvements to our working conditions we need. You can RSVP for our meeting using the following link:
If you have any questions at all, please call your Union Rep Christie Harris @ 206-436-6606*
*Note: this is an office line and cannot receive text messages
“We are holding firm. We want to make sure we get employees the benefits and wages that they deserve. Our goal with this contract is to retain our current employees and attract new hires. We will not back down!”
— Ashley Strickland, Respiratory Transport
Our SCH Tech bargaining team: Matt Brabant - Respiratory Educator, Madison Derksema - Pharmacy Tech, Angela Ballard – Surgical Tech, Kellie Koenig – Ultrasound Tech, Ashley Strickland – Respiratory Transport, Tyler Schaffer – Anesthesia Tech, Tesfaldet Kidanemariam – Respiratory Therapist
