Nurses at Northside Medical Center in Youngstown, Ohio, conducted a one-day work stoppage Tuesday in their fight against management contract proposals that, among other provisions, would prohibit nurses from speaking out about patient safety and quality care, according to the Youngstown General Duty Nurses Association ( YGDNA ).
Sign the petition to tell management nurses deserve a fair contract .
An editorial in the South Jersey Times calls on the U.S. Senate to approve President Barack Obama's nominations to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to ensure nurses at Memorial Hospital of Salem County have their rights to collective bargaining protected. More than two years ago, the nurses voted to form a union and attempted to enter into contract negotiations with Community Health Systems (CHS), the owner of the hospital. CHS refused to recognize the union and the appealed the election to the NLRB. The case remains in limbo because of a federal appeals court decision that is obstructing the work of the NLRB by severely limiting the president's authority to make recess appointments when Congress won't act on nominees.
While most attention in the Boston tragedy is rightfully focused on the victims of last Monday's bombings at the Boston Marathon, the damage done by the terrorist attacks didn't end with the explosions or the subsequent shootout that led to additional deaths. Much of the city shut down during the manhunt for the terror suspects; and while most salaried employees could take the day off without losing pay, low-wage workers did not have that luxury. Other workers were forced to work long hours or brave dangerous conditions to get their jobs done.
For sick or injured Bahrainis, going to the hospital means risking a prison term—or even death. Describing the “militarization of hospitals,” Rula al-Saffar, president of the Bahrain Nursing Society, said patients with “head traumas, broken bones or burns” are first interrogated by police to determine if they are involved in protests against the government. Health professionals are only allowed to treat patients after police investigate and clear them for treatment. For some, the delay means death.
While most states saw a decline in union membership in 2012 , California bucked the trend as 100,000 new workers joined collective bargaining units. Pushing the growth were Latino workers and nurses, the Los Angeles Times reported today . Overall, 11.3% of America's workers are current union members, which is a smaller percentage from 2011 , but in California, the number is closer to 18% and is growing. Other southwestern states, such as Nevada and Texas, are also seeing growth in union membership.
Working people up and down the East Coast are pitching in to alert people about the clean up efforts for Hurricane Sandy and provide information for transportation, shelter and other resources. Firefighters, public employees, utility workers, letter carriers, nurses, grocery store employees, hotel workers and others continued to work through the storm to make sure everyone is taken care of. Once again, we’re reminded that work connects us all, and we’re better together. Here are some unions and agencies you can follow on Twitter and Facebook who've been hard at work during the storm:
Walking through CarolinaFest in Charlotte, N.C., this past Labor Day, you could buy a funnel cake, ride down a bouncy slide—and hug a union “thug .”
Compliments of the North Carolina State AFL-CIO , the Hug A Thug booth featured teachers, firefighters, nurses—just about everyone who’s a union member and/or thug, depending upon your political perspective. The union movement's "hug a union thug" campaign poked fun at conservative attempts to scapegoat union members.
Nathan Adrian, 23, of Bremerton, Wash., took home his first individual gold medal in the 100-meter freestyle swim in the London Olympic Games last week, winning by a "fingertip," beating Australian favorite James "The Missile" Magnussen.
The Seattle Times reported :
The margin of victory—one-hundredth of a second—was the tightest at the London Olympics.
Perhaps the swimmer's work ethic can be traced to his upbringing in a union family. Adrian's father, Jim, is a retired nuclear engineer for the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard and former president of the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers (IFPTE) Local 12 . His mother, Cecilia, is a nurse in the Bremerton school district. Check back on the AFL-CIO Now blog next Monday for an exclusive interview with Jim and Cecilia Adrian.
This is National Nurses Week and National Nurses United ( NNU ) is sending out “a simple THANK YOU” to the nation’s 3.1 million registered nurses because:
Your work is not easy. You must have compassion and endurance to be there in the middle of the night, when your patient is struggling with pain. You must have patience and courage to fight that bureaucratic red tape that’s delaying your patient’s medications from the hospital pharmacy.
It’s been four years since low-wage workers got a raise. Sign the petition to tell Congress it’s time to raise the minimum wage.
Click here »
Tell us about the good stuff happening where you live and work.
