Wage complaint forwarded to Attorney General for prosecution
Resurrection Health Care owes $381,000 in overtime pay to Home Health employees
After years of appeals by Resurrection Health Care, the state Department of Labor has forwarded the wage complaint of employees in the health care chain’s Home Health division to the Office of the Attorney General for prosecution. The Illinois Department of Labor (IDOL) previously ruled that Resurrection Health Care owes $381,000 in back wages to 64 Home Health employees.
Home Health Services employees filed complaints with the IDOL in 2003 charging that the chain’s “fee-for-visit” system consistently failed to pay them for hours worked beyond their normal schedule.
The IDOL agreed with the employees and cited Resurrection for violations of the state’s wage and hour law regarding overtime pay. But RHC refused to adjust the employees’ pay accordingly and instead spent years filing appeals.
On April 9th, nurses from across Illinois gathered in Springfield to
lobby for legislation that would improve nurse staffing at the
bedside. At a hearing held by the House Health Care Availability and
Access Committee, RN2RN Network nurses provided compelling testimony
regarding the need for safe nurse-to-patient staffing ratios in all
Illinois hospitals.
Following the hearing, nurses lobbied their legislators to sign on to a
letter to the Illinois Department of Public Health, urging the
department to ensure that Illinois hospitals provide accurate, detailed
and comprehensive data about nurse staffing – including information
about nurse staffing by clinical service area and unit.
Nurses believe that accurate data about current nurse staffing will
make it clear to lawmakers that action is needed to protect patient
safety and improve working conditions for nurses.
"Talking with so many nurses at the conference about the big nursing issues was very exciting, empowering, liberating, and insightful to me as a professional nurse." - Edith Asidao, RN Sts. Mary and Elizabeth Medical Center
That was the feeling nurses came out with after the RN2RN Network conference, titled "Nursing at the Crossroads: Charting Our Future," was held February 23rd. The conference focused on some of the most important issues facing the nursing profession.
A few of the highlights of the conference included:
Suzanne Gordon, our featured speaker, was snowed-in in Boston but joined us through videoconference and gave some hints on topics that will be covered in her upcoming book, Safety in Numbers, scheduled to come out in April- including remarkable gains improved staffing made by nurses in Australia.
Labor Board Issues Complaint Against Resurrection Health Care
Hospital chain attempted to silence union activist
The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has issued an unfair labor practice complaint against Resurrection Health Care for attempting to silence a union supporter at West Suburban Medical Center. The NLRB charge stems from an October incident when a supervisor told a union activist that he could no longer speak to his coworkers in the Food Service department. The supervisor's order came a week after the employees spoke at an event outside of a Resurrection fundraiser. A hearing on the complain has been scheduled for March 12, 2008.
The NLRB complaint contends that West Suburban usaed an "overly broad rule which prohibits employtees from speaking to coworkers about concerns affecting conditions of employment and which discriminatorily singles out union supporters." The complaint also charges that Resurrection "has been interfering with, restraining, and coercing employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed in . . . the [National Labor Relations] Act."
Resurrection's Anti-Union Record Highlighted at Global Summit
The HEART organizing campaign was highlighted this week during a Global Organizing Summit in Washington, D.C. Almost 200 union leaders from around the world came together for the summit to discuss strategies for organizing against employer hostility. Kelly Beringer, a nurse at West Suburban Hospital, told the forum how Resurrection has systematically fought workers' efforts to form a union, which has led to 14 unfair labor practice settlements in four years.
Language Assistance Lacking at Resurrection Hospitals
Systematic failures in language assistance services affect quality of care
According to a complaint filed with the Office for Civil Rights of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Resurrection Health Care is failing to provide language assistance services required by federal law. The complaint, which was filed by the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME)Council 31, alleges that Resurrection has systematically failed to provide the most basic forms of language assistance services to ensure equal access to health care for all patients regardless of English language proficiency.
OSHA fines Resurrection Health Care's West Suburban Medical Center
Hospital fined $7,500 for exposing workers to asbestos
The U.S. Department of Labor Occupational Safety and
Health Administration (OSHA) recently fined West Suburban
Medical Center
$7500 for three “serious” asbestos-related violations. The violations include failing to inform housekeeping
employees that asbestos was present in places they work, failing to post
warning signs at the entrances where asbestos-containing materials were
present, and failing to provide training to the employees, at no cost, on the
dangers of asbestos.According to the
U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, repeated exposure to asbestos
increases the risk of a variety of lung problems, including cancer.
International watchdog group singles out Resurrection for anti-union violations Group cites Chicago health care chain among nation's worst violators of union rights
A new survey by an international watchdog group singled out Resurrection Health Care for violating the rights of employees.
Released by the Brussels-based International Trade Union
Confederation (ITUC), the 2007 Survey of Violations of Trade Unions Rights includes
Resurrection Health Care among the worst violators of union rights in the United States.
Report documents skewed pay policies at Resurrection Health Care Executives pay themselves lavishly while workers are mired in poverty
Council 31 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) have issued a new report documenting low wage levels that keep patient-support staff art Resurrection Health Care hospitals mired in poverty and unable to support their families. Resurrection Health Care (RHC) is the second largest non-profit hospital system in the Chicago metropolitan area. It encompasses eight hospitals, as well as nursing homes, home health services, and outpatient clinics.
Entitled Coming Up Short: Resurrection Health Care's Distorted Pay Priorities, the report depicts a starkly skewed pay structure in which the compensation of RHC hospital executives significantly exceeds national norms while the meager wages of patient-support staff (housekeepers, laundry and food service workers) fall far short of self-sufficiency standards in the Chicago area.
Judge Upholds Overtime Pay Ruling for Resurrection Home Health Workers
Department of Labor cites hospital chain with labor law violations and orders it to pay back wages
Chief Administrative Law Judge Claudia Manley has
denied Resurrection Health Care’s appeal of an Illinois Department of Labor
(IDOL) ruling that found the hospital chain in violation of the state’s labor
standards law regarding overtime pay.In
a decision issued on June 29, Judge Manley rejected Resurrection’s challenge to
the audit process that determined the amount of back pay that the health care
system owed employees in its Home Health Services division.
Religious Leaders Appeal
to Catholic Health Association
More than 300 people gathered
outside a national meeting of the Catholic Health Association (CHA) on Monday,
June 18, to call attention to the corporate priorities of Resurrection Health
Care, a CHA affiliate.The demonstrators
called on Resurrection to stop its attempts to stifle the efforts of its
employees who are seeking to form a union and immediately begin a dialogue with
the HEART organizing committee.
AFSCME Sec.-Treas. Lucy leads rally against discrimination at Resurrection hospital
National labor and civil rights leader William (Bill) Lucy joined Resurrection Health Care employees, members of the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists, and community allies at a May 23rd rally to demand that West Suburban Hospital halt discrimination against minority employees. After the rally, Lucy and representatives of the participating community organizations marched to the hospital to deliver a letter to West Suburban CEO Jay Kreuzer demanding an end to the discriminatory practices. While a delegation went inside to deliver the letter, other participants lined Austin Boulevard in front of the hospital with signs reading "Justice at RHC", eliciting a tremendous amount of support from passing drivers.
Bond analysts: working with employees could improve RHC's finances
Resurrection could improve its standing in the bond market if the hospital chain resolved its conflict with employees, according to one of the nation's top bond rating services. On April 19, Moody's Investors Service lowered Resurrection's bond ratings on $707.6 million of debt and reaffirmed its negative outlook for the company.
Henry Bayer, Executive Director of AFSCME Council 31, urged the company to make peace with its employees in light of the urgent need to improve its financial condition. "Resurrection management cannot expect to improve its performance unless it treats its employees fairly and allows them to have a voice on the job," Bayer said. "You cannot run a successful business, never mind a hospital, if you refuse to heed workers' legitimate aspirations."
Nurses Spur Action in House and Senate for Staffing Ratios
Despite fierce opposition from the Illinois Hospital Association, AFSCME's campaign for safe staffing in Illinois hospitals took a big step forward when state lawmakers recently voted to pass nurse staffing legislation out of committees in the Senate and House. Last week, SB 936 passed out the of the Senate Human Services Committee by an overwhelming majority in the wake of compelling testimony from Diana Connal, an RN who works at Saints Mary and Elizabeth Medical Center, a Resurrection Health Care hospital. The House Committee on Health Care Accessibility had previously voted to send out a companion bill (HB 392) after a contentious debate. Both measures would establish minimum standards to assure sufficient nurse staffing on the frontlines of Illinois hospitals.
Lawmakers were moved by nurses who participated in the Safe Nurse Staffing Lobby Day on March 13, when dozens of Resurrection RN's joined nurses from around Illinois to lobby for nurse staffing ratios legislation. Resurrection nurses have been in the forefront of the fight to pass the legislation, which would establish minimum patient-to-nurse ratios and require hospitals to develop written staffing plans based on patient acuity.
Get the facts on the quality of care at Resurrection hospitals
In an attempt to help consumers make informed healthcare decisions, AFSCME has produced a report that examines the quality of care provided at Resurrection Health Care hospitals. The report includes Resurrection's record on patient safety, patient care spending, public health citations and pricing.
Large crowd gathers to hear Obama, others, pledge support for RHC workers
Nearly 2,000 hospital workers, union members and supporters came together for a rally on Sat. March 3 in Chicago to show support for Resurrection workers and the Employee Free Choice Act. Featured speakers included Sen. Dick Durbin, U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky, AFL-CIO President John Sweeney and AFSCME International President Gerald McEntee, but the star of the show was clearly Sen. Barack Obama who told Resurrection workers to "Keep marching for justice." "Where there is injustice anywhere," he said, "it suppresses justice everywhere. And organized labor has a history of bringing about justice."
OSHA cites St. Francis Hospital for six serious violations
The federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has issued six serious citations against St. Francis Hospital of Evanston stemming from a toxic mercury spill that affected patients and employees last July. Following an investigation, OSHA also fined the facility $25,000 for falling to have in place an appropriate emergency response plan, for inadequately training employees and for failing to notify workers of potential health hazards.
Resurrection Health Care recently submitted a letter of intent to the Illinois Health Facilities Planning Board outlining a planned $90 million expansion at its flagship hospital, Resurrection Medical Center.An article in Crain’s asks if the expansion is the right move right now:
“The eight-hospital chain has seen profit margins plunge after acquiring several struggling Catholic hospitals since 2001: Operating losses more than doubled to $78 million in the fiscal year ended June 30 on revenue of $1.3 billion. Analysts who rate Resurrection's bonds have begun to question CEO Joseph Toomey's growth strategy and execution.”
The expansion includes 126,300 square feet of new construction to house an addition to the hospital with five stories and a ground floor.Among the elements of the construction are a modernized conference center, a cardiodiagnostics center, a new acute rehabilitation unit, and 46,500 square feet of remodeled non-clinical space and remodeled bed unit conversions.
King Day event in Oak Park highlights discrimination problems at West Suburban hospital
More than 100 people gathered in front of Resurrection Health Care's West Suburban Medical Center in Oak Park on Martin Luther King Jr. Day to protest the hospital's unfair treatment of African-American and Latino employees who work in the housekeeping department.
Employees and community groups who support them marked King Day with a rally calling on West Suburban CEO, Jay Kreuzer to put a halt to racially discriminatory practices at the hospital. Participants in the King Day gathering also delivered petitions to Kreuzer signed by over 1,000 local residents. Ten employees at West Suburban Hospital filed complaints with the Illinois Department of Human Rights after hospital management failed to respond to their charges of discrimination in the Housekeeping Department. The complaints allege unequal pay and treatment, as well as on-the-job segregation and outright harassment. One of the complainants alleges that a supervisor used negative stereotypes in comparing her behavior to “gangbangers.”
“Doing housekeeping work in a hospital is never easy. But our jobs got much harder three years ago when we got a new manager. Since then Black and Latino workers have faced all kinds of discrimination - from unequal treatment to unfair firing,” said Shelly Harrison, a former West Suburban Hospital employee.
Over
the past few weeks, Resurrection nurses have met with several key state
legislators in order to discuss the safe staffing legislation they intend to support this session.After early meetings
with state Senator Don Harmon and state Representative Harry Osterman, groups
of nurses have also met with state Representatives Angelo “Skip” Saviano, and
Elizabeth Coulson.Nurses will be
continuing to meet with state legislators to discuss the conditions inside
Resurrection hospitals and hospitals across Illinois-conditions that are
forcing dedicated nurses out of the profession and aggravating the nursing
shortage.
Nurses with state Representative Angelo "Skip" Saviano
Resurrection's Anti-Union Record Highlighted at Global Summit
Religious Leaders Appeal
to Catholic Health Association
AFSCME Sec.-Treas. Lucy leads rally against discrimination at Resurrection hospital
pledge support for RHC workers
HERE