Tufts, nurses slate one more try
Meeting today as strike looms
Tufts Medical Center and the union representing its 1,259 nurses are scheduled to meet this morning for one last negotiating session to try to avert tomorrow’s planned strike.
If the two sides fail to reach a compromise, Tufts will bring in 320 temporary nurses from U.S. Nursing staffing agency — at a cost of $6 million — during the one-day job action, which is set to begin at 7 a.m. tomorrow, and the hospital’s subsequent fourday lockout of nurses who participate in the strike, Chief Nursing Officer Terry Hudson-Jinks said during a press conference yesterday.
“The union is taking this action ... because they believe they can hold Tufts Medical Center hostage for more money,” said Dr. Michael Wagner, the hospital’s president and CEO, who earns an annual base salary of $800,000. “The Massachusetts Nurses Association appears to be willfully oblivious ... to the fact that we receive much less funding than our competitors.”
The union’s qualms center on staffing levels, pay and pensions. The union wants the hospital to have more nurses work throughout the facility. It also has said that Tufts nurses are paid considerably less than their peers at other local hospitals and that the disparity results in the hospital losing talent.
“Nurses come here, get trained and leave to make $3 to $10 an hour more at other hospitals,” said Barbara Tiller, co-chair of the nurses’ bargaining unit. “As a result, we don’t have the staff to do everything we need to do — and patients are the ones paying the price for it.”
The hospital had proposed raises ranging from 5.5 percent to 10.5 percent over four years, with the largest raises going to nurses at the top of the pay scale. But because of the $6 million it is spending on the planned strike, it has slashed its offer to increases ranging from 3 percent to 5 percent. Nurses below the top of the pay scale already receive 5 percent annual raises.
Tufts also wants 341 nurses to trade their pensions for definedcontribution retirement plans, which the hospital says would not cause any nurses to lose benefits, but which the union says would result in some having to pay more toward their retirement.
The hospital has said there will be added security, police and “ambassadors” to help patients navigate potential issues during the strike and lockout.