In the wake of a continued standoff between University of Rochester Medicine Homecare (URMH) workers and leaders in unionization efforts, workers have voted to strike for up to 5 days. They had previously picketed and went on strike for a single day, Feb. 24.
URMH is a home care service of itinerant healthcare professionals who travel to their patients’ residences, including registered nurses (RNs), physical therapists, and medical social workers.
Tracey Harrison, Vice President of the 1199 SEIU (United Healthcare Workers East) union, stated that workers’ “number one issue” was that, despite the URMH website characterizing the company as “understand[ing] work-life balance and car[ing] about [workers’] time,” they have been forced to take on more work than they can effectively handle.
“[Our members] have what [they] consider as unreasonable, unattainable productivity requirements,” he said.
Robert Austen, a physical therapist at URMH, explained that workers have been put in “a really rotten spot” due to having to squeeze more work into the same time that they previously had.
“We used to see less people; we could give them our all,” he said. “Now, we’re forced to shorten our visits, leave visits early, just so we can race sometimes from 20, 30 miles to the next visit. I don’t think that that’s great care, and I don’t want to continue in this manner.”
These productivity requirements were exacerbated by recent changes: According to a February statement, URMH has 26 unfilled positions and has asked workers to cover additional shifts to care for patients.
Besides pushing for a more manageable caseload, vice president Harrison said workers hope for higher retirement contributions, more competitive wages, and better healthcare coverage (currently they pay for high-deductible but low-quality plans).
Despite months of negotiations, the URMH workers and leaders have struggled to reach an agreement. A statement from 1199 SEIU attributes this to employers “repeatedly bouncing back and forth between open economic topics – never settling or signing any agreement in ink.”
According to a mid-March statement, the negotiations have made slight progress, with “non-economic items and nearly half of the economic items [having] been tentatively agreed upon by both sides.” However, the “major outstanding economic issues” like caseload, health insurance, and pay have yet to be resolved.
Because of this, Harrison said that workers believe the employers are negotiating in “bad faith.” He explained how the workers’ bargaining committee would spend upwards of twelve sessions discussing the same topics with URMH leaders without reaching a resolution.
“Without fail, at the [next] meeting, again, they would come back only to say, ‘No, we’re going to stay with our previous position,’” Harrison said. “So, just going backwards with the negotiating process, constantly. As we like to say, the target is constantly moving.”
He also described how on at least two occasions, the workers and leaders reached a verbal agreement that never came to fruition.
“Based from our […] viewpoint, it was just going to be a matter of coming back together in the official setting and handing the proposals across the table, and the parties would sign off on those particular proposals,” Harrison said. “Well, [that was] wishful thinking — the employer came back and again went backwards on the verbal agreement.”
According to Harrison, URMH’s lawyer told the workers that the employers wanted them to “come along with our proposals” rather than compromising.
“Our folks are […] committed to the process, committed with the understanding that this is negotiations,” Harrison said. “It is some give and take. This employer is refusing to give on anything to try to meet somewhere in the middle. Right now, it seems like there is just a stalling in place.”
Workers have made it clear that they are prepared to strike again.
“One of the biggest things, or one of the most important things, that an employee has is their labor,” Harrison said. “To be able to say to an employer that is not doing right by them, ‘I am going to withhold my labor from you today until you recognize and provide what is necessary for me to be able to take care of the patients, and also take care of myself and my family.’”
