SEIU-UHW members at Catholic Healthcare West facilities across the state have overwhelmingly voted by a 92% majority to strengthen their contract by:

• Fixing our pension to increase with our pay
• Improving on-call pay to create a Statewide minimum of $5 while preserving higher standards where they exist
• Establishing a Statewide weekend differential of 30 cents

Our SEIU-UHW member-elected bargaining team at Catholic Healthcare West is recommending we vote "YES" on our new agreement to guarantee improvements to our pensions, weekend differentials, and on-call pay. We stood up to management throughout bargaining and took action statewide through purple-ups, petitions, and delegations in order to meet our contract goals. Now it's time to lock in our improvements--Let's get out and VOTE!

Last night our SEIU-UHW bargaining team secured a tentative agreement with Catholic Healthcare West to improve our pension, weekend differentials, and on-call pay.

At the start of negotiations, CHW said they wouldn't spend more than $2 million additional per year to improve the pension, and $2.3 million for differentials and on-call pay-an agreement signed by ousted UHW official, and current NUHW leader, John Borsos.

Bargaining team cleans up mess left by ousted former leaders

On May 20, our bargaining team met with management to continue to fight for our collateral pay and negotiate with CHW on an alternative to the current Borsos GDP retirement plan. In a strong showing of strength and unity, our bargaining team was joined by more than 25 CHW stewards from the Sacramento area, sending a clear message that we're committed to our collateral pay and creating a fair new pension plan.

Latest bargaining session tackles pension and collateral pay

Our SEIU-UHW member-bargaining committee met with CHW on April 28 and May 4 to continue discussions of improving our retirement and collateral pay. CHW presented a new pension proposal to ?x the problems with our GDP pension negotiated by ousted union o?cial John Borsos. Our seriously ?awed current GDP plan was created by Borsos and CHW and froze bene?ts, tied bene?ts to 2005 wages, and contained many imbalances.

Position: Contract Specialist

Category: Full-time

To download an application, click here (PDF)

Summary

An Individual appointed to the Contract Specialist role is expected to serve a non-renewable one (1) year position and upon completion of the leave will be returned to his/her former job, if available, or to a comparable position in the same classification, shift, and work hours. The Contract Specialist duties will include contract interpretation and administration, contract education, guidance in grievance and problem resolution, improvement in shop steward capacity, collaborative interaction with facility leadership, work on committees to advance such goals as quality care and patient satisfaction and consistent contract application.

Why the current education fund isn't working for SEIU-UHW members at CHW

Our contract with CHW guarantees a payment every year into the "SEIU UHW-West and Joint Employer Education Fund." Unfortunately, our voice in the fund is still controlled by John Borsos, Sal Rosselli, and other former UHW officials who were removed from union office last year.

Our SEIU-UHW contract guarantees money every year from CHW for member education. But for the past several years, members haven't been in control of the money. Very few of us at CHW have taken advantage of this important benefit--or even know about it.

In part, that's because John Borsos and other former leaders of UHW who were removed from office are still in charge of our education money. We don't control it, and most of us can't use it.

Representatives of our SEIU-UHW member-elected bargaining team met again with management on July 23 to discuss ways to fix our pension and improve collateral pay (shift differentials, standby pay, etc) at CHW. Improvements to our pay and benefits will help recruit and retain the best, most experienced employees--so we can give the best quality care to our patients.

Over the last several months, CHW members have been electing new members to serve as stewards in our worksites. On June 27, CHW stewards joined other SEIU-UHW stewards at training sessions throughout the state. Experienced UHW members lead the training, and now we'll be better equipped to help members enforce our contract and re-build a strong, thriving local union.

Together, we're making sure every member in every CHW facility is represented and has a strong voice.

Get involved today! E-mail: Your.CHW.Team@seiu-uhw.org »

SEIU-UHW members are bargaining serious improvements to our pensions and collateral pay (shift differentials, on-call pay). But the former officers of our local who were removed for misusing our dues money formed a rival organization called NUHW for the sole purpose of destroying all that we have built.

More than once, NUHW has tried filing for a decertification election at our CHW facilities, and lost. Once again, the Federal government's National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) is saying "NO" to NUHW's attempts to divide and distract us.

Our 2009 bargaining team has grown to 43, with more elections to come!

We all deserve a fair retirement. That's why, as members of the member-elected bargaining team at CHW, we proposed a new pension plan at our last session bargaining session (June 26 in Sacramento). Our goal has always been to improve the current plan by making it fairer and linking our retirement to our final salary. Here's what we propose:

• Base our pension on our final year's salary, instead of our pay as of January 1, 2005.
• Replace the current "tiers" in the GDP with a percentage of our final salary. This is a much fairer system. It allows our retirement income to grow in proportion to our salary.
• Use accrued extended sick leave to boost our retirement income.