Strike, including foodservice, underway at Oregon hospital

SPRINGFIELD, Ore. — Nursing assistants and other employees are on a three-day strike meant to bring McKenzie-Willamette Medical Center management to the bargaining table over pay and benefits.

More than 300 workers represented by Service Employees International Union 49 started the strike at 6:30 a.m. Tuesday. They held a midmorning rally, with about 50 people carrying signs and forming a picket line on the Mohawk Boulevard sidewalk in front of the hospital.

Carey Myers, a housekeeper and union bargaining team member, noted that the union held a one-day strike against the hospital four years ago. That walkout was followed by several months of negotiations and eventually a labor contract, she said.

Frustrated this year by the hospital’s latest wage and health care proposals for a new contract, union members once again are refusing to go to work.

“This time around we are doing a three-day strike,” Myers said. “We hope it will be effective and we can get quicker results out of it.”

The union is trying to put public and financial pressure on the 800-employee hospital, while minimizing financial hardship on its members, representatives said.

During the walkout, the strikers do not receive their regular pay, and the union strike fund compensates for only a portion of that.

The strike involves about 340 workers, including emergency room and monitor technicians, phlebotomists, admitting clerks, housekeepers, food service workers, respiratory therapists, radiology technicians and physical therapy aides.

The hospital has hired an undisclosed number of local replacement workers.

Myers said Mc¬Kenzie-Willamette also has brought in workers from other states.

“This is costing them a lot of money,” she said of the strike. “When (hospital management) bring in workers from out-of-state, they have to fly them here and put them up in hotels. And they often have to pay them double or triple our wages.”