December 14, 2009
The day that she became the first executive director of the nation’s largest nurse union, Rose Ann DeMoro took to the microphone at the group’s inaugural rally and pointed to a nearby statue of a famed Native American historical figure.
“This is the first group of people who were told that labor-management partnerships would work for them,” DeMoro declared to the enthusiastic union crowd assembled with protest signs outside the Arizona Hospital and Healthcare Association, according to her own recounting of the anecdote afterward.
The comment equated American pioneers known for their brutality and broken promises with modern hospital administrators who have increasingly been using written agreements between labor and management to quiet the discontent of the unionization process. It was the kind of DeMoro-esque comment that thrills many union nurses and sends shivers of emotion through healthcare executives.
“The people who have their hands on the levers of power here don’t have ideas that we would consider mainstream ideas,” said management labor consultant Chris Cimino, president and CEO of Chessboard Consulting. “There is some very radical ideology that is in charge of driving the NNU.”
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December 8, 2009
Yesterday, Rose Ann De Moro, Executive Director of the California Nurses Association, pulled off a stunning victory that has been nearly 15 years in the making. With the merger of the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee, Massachusetts Nurses Association and United American Nurses – De Moro’s dream of building a national union for registered nurses is finally complete (with the formation of National Nurses United or NNU). Read More
December 1, 2009
On November 23rd, the current President of the United American Nurses (Ann Converso) and Joan Craft, (a VP of UAN and a representative for the Illinois Nurses Association), filed an action in the Northern District of Illinois seeking an injunction to prevent the impending merger of the National Nurses Organizing Committee, the Massachusetts Nurses Association and the United American Nurses into a “Super Union” – the National Nurses United or NNU. Read More
November 3, 2009
Formation of the largest nurses’ union and professional association in U.S. history took another major step forward Monday with a unanimous endorsement of the affiliation agreement vote by delegates representing 80 percent of the members of the United American Nurses (UAN). Even as a number of state affiliates inexplicably failed to attend the meeting, the national delegate assembly of the UAN moved forward to create the 150,000 member RN “Super Union.”
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November 1, 2009
A union sued two Las Vegas hospitals Thursday over a policy requiring hospital employees to receive flu shots — or to wear surgical masks in patient areas if they are not vaccinated.
The Service Employees International Union Local 1107 sued Nashville-based Healthcare Corporation of America and two of its Las Vegas hospitals: Sunrise and its Sunrise Children’s Hospital; and Southern Hills Hospital. HCA also owns MountainView Hospital in Las Vegas.
The lawsuit says the company has threatened to discipline employees who fail to abide by the policy, which the union says requires non-vaccinated employees to wear masks except when in cafeterias, break rooms, smoking areas and private offices.
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