Dear Providence
Nearly 5,000 healthcare professionals from Providence Health & Services in Oregon, who are represented by the Oregon Nurses Association and the Pacific Northwest Hospital Medicine Association, recently authorized strikes. Many have been at the bargaining table for more than a year and are working without contracts. Providence is a $29 billion corporation that pays its CEO more than $12 million per year but has failed to make the necessary investments in safe staffing, patient care, and recruiting and retaining employees. Here is their message to Providence.
Due to Providence’s repeated failures to listen to and bargain with frontline workers, ONA has filed multiple unfair labor practices with the National Labor Relations Board alleging the following: refusal to bargain, bargaining in bad faith, unilateral implementation of mandatory subjects, denial of access to employee representatives, and retaliation against union leaders.
If a strike is called, it would be both the largest healthcare strike and the first doctors’ strike in Oregon history. The corporatization of healthcare has left many Providence employees frustrated and burned out as they are being told to spend less and less time with patients and more time trying to drive up profits.
From dangerous practices — like understaffing critical care units and emergency rooms — that delay care and endanger patients, Providence has ignored its responsibilities to workers and Oregonians. Healthcare workers are asking Providence to invest more in patient safety, to follow Oregon’s landmark Safe Staffing Law, and offer regionally competitive wages and benefits to be able to recruit and retain more staff.
Striking is a last resort, and these employees are eager to settle this at the bargaining table. The ONA is committed to bargaining around the clock to ensure this strike is averted, but Providence must be willing to come to the table with a serious offer.
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