For the past four years, managers at AHMC Anaheim Regional Medical Center have promised workers at the facility a raise but have not delivered.
“They just keep saying they don’t have any money,” said Lauren Irwin, a lead respiratory therapist who has worked at the hospital for eight years.
“The nurses got a raise, but they refused to give our department an increase, or to all the other non-nursing departments,” she added.
Frustrated with empty promises, broken or malfunctioning equipment, and a lack of input in patient care, 315 workers at the Orange County facility overwhelmingly voted by a nearly five-to-one ratio to join NUHW. The workers include medical and pharmacy technicians, patient care assistants, unit secretaries, facility engineers, and clerical assistants.
AHMC is a for-profit hospital company based in Southern California that includes Seton Medical Center in Daly City, where NUHW members have had to fight hard to retain their medical benefits and secure safe staffing levels, and Whittier Hospital and Medical Center, where workers are also organizing a union with NUHW.
Irwin said that AHMC’s Anaheim hospital is among the lowest-paying in the system, leaving its workers struggling to make ends meet. “The cost of living is so expensive, and we’re not making any more money to compensate for that,” Irwin said.
Now, she and her coworkers have the opportunity to negotiate pay raises to make up for that gap, which would help the hospital better recruit and retain workers.
“Everyone that I know is really excited,” Iwin said of the recent union victory. “They’re all giving me recommendations on what to bargain for.”
She hopes the hospital-wide support for the union effort carries over to the negotiating table and they can make a difference for everyone.
“We want to feel appreciated, and right now we don’t feel we’re appreciated because it’s been four years since a raise,” she said.
“If we bargain this properly,” Irwin said, “we can do much better for ourselves and our patients.”
