KAISER WORKERS WALK OUT WITH STRIKING ENGINEERS
Protests in Vallejo are part of demonstration
Kaiser Permanente employees walked out on Thursday morning at Northern California medical centers in sympathy with engineers, who have been striking for about two months over wage disputes.
At least 40,000 members of unions SEIU-UHW, OPEIU Local 29 and IFPTE Local 20, representing healthcare workers, optometrists, phlebotomists, Xray technicians, clinical lab scientists and other employees, were scheduled to participate in the walk-out. Some of them started picketing at 7 a.m. at Kaiser facilities in the Bay Area.
Hundreds were on the picket line at the Kaiser Santa Clara Medical Center, shaking tambourines and holding signs that read “$6.4 billion in profits” and “United Kaiser Can’t Divide Us” while car horns blared in support.
“We consider an injury to one is an injury to all,” said Heather Wright, who works in the OBGYN department at Kaiser
Santa Clara as a family planning clerk and was among the picketers as part of SEIU-UHW. “What’s happening with our Local 39 engineers would eventually happen to Local 20, Local 29, to CNA — our nurses — and to us as united health care workers at UHW. We are all out here supporting our union brothers and sisters.”
According to SEIU-UHW, the sympathy strike is the largest in the country.
“They’re effectively getting a pay cut and housing prices are getting higher in the Bay Area,” said Ethan Ruskin, a health educator at Kaiser San Jose and a member of the SEIU-UHW. “For a company that made $6 billion in profit during the pandemic to be offering that — they’re not asking for the moon, they’re asking for a fair contract.”
The engineers have been on strike since their contract expired on Sept. 17 because they say they’re getting paid lower rates by Kaiser than other health care providers in the Bay Area. The engineers include hoisting and portable engineers, who
work in construction, and stationary engineers, who operate and maintain systems in hospitals, facilities and other buildings. Kaiser countered that engineers earn more than $180,000 in wages and benefits and that union leadership is “asking for unreasonable increases far beyond any other union at Kaiser Permanente.”
Ben Maka, a stationary engineer
at Kaiser Santa Clara, said he’s been out at the strike line at least five days a week since it began.
“We’ve been out here for 62 days. We’re not asking to be the highest-paid in the valley, we just want to be paid like our peers,” Maka said. “All of Sutter Health, El Camino Health, they make more than we do and all
we’re asking is to be paid prevailing wages and Kaiser’s not even offering to pay inflation.”
More than 20,000 registered nurses and 2,000 mental health professionals represented by the National Union of Healthcare Workers are also planning to sympathy strike on Friday if an agreement isn’t reached by then.
Kaiser said in a statement that bargaining talks with Local 39 resumed on Tuesday and Wednesday and it’s “committed to bargaining as long as it takes to reach an agreement that continues to reward our employees and supports health care affordability, just as we have with several unions this week.”
The clash between the health care giant and its workers come as medical centers prepare for the influx of COVID-19 patients during an anticipated winter surge. Kaiser’s medical centers across the Bay Area, all the way out to Sacramento and into the Central Valley, are impacted by the sympathy strikes.
Kaiser said on Wednesday that all of their medical centers in Northern California are diverting stroke and severe heart attack patients to other centers through Friday. Emergency departments will stay open but patients could “encounter longer wait times this week due to a labor strike,” according to Kaiser.
“During the strike, care will be provided by physicians and experienced clinical managers and staff, with the support of trained and qualified contingency staff,” Kaiser said.
Some Kaiser patients said their health care has been impacted by the strikes. Kaiser has said that “some nonurgent medical appointments or procedures may be affected.”
Richard Marsh, of San
Jose, had an urgent care appointment scheduled for Thursday morning for a swollen foot and was told he had to get an X-ray first. After going to Kaiser San Jose, he said he was turned away because the X-ray department was closed.
“I’m going over to the emergency department to see if they’ll let me have an X-ray. If not, I’m screwed,” Marsh said. “I’ve had Kaiser since 1987. I’ve never run into anything like this.”
Kaiser said in a statement that it’s “made extensive preparations so that during this strike, engineering duties are handled by skilled and experienced engineers, including those brought in from Kaiser Permanente facilities in other regions across the country.”
Kaiser reached a deal early Monday morning with thousands of its pharmacists, averting a strike that sent patients rushing to refill prescriptions before the planned pharmacy shutdowns. Kaiser is encouraging employees who joined the sympathy strike to come to work instead.
“We question why leaders of other unions are asking their members to walk out on patients on Nov. 18 and 19 in sympathy for Local 39,” the health provider said. “This will not bring us closer to an agreement and most important, it is unfair to our members and patients to disrupt their care when they most need our employees to be there for them.”
In addition to the engineers, mental health workers, including social workers, psychologists and marriage and family therapists, represented by the National Union of Healthcare Workers, also have an expired contract.
Kaiser said that it’s “indisputably one of the most labor-friendly organizations” in the country, while stressing to unions participating in the sympathy strikes that “in accordance with their contracts, these sympathy strikes are not protected by law.”