For the fifth consecutive bargaining session, Kaiser came to the table with no proposals. Throughout the day, they spent less than an hour in the room with us. After we presented several revised proposals on economic issues (see summary below), management caucused for 2.5 hours and returned with a “package” of nine non-economic proposals. Eight of these were to maintain their last proposal or current contract language. The other was a minor change to the proposal on New Technology.
After another caucus of an hour, Management responded to our incentive plan proposal by making minor tweaks to the metrics for psychiatry and social medicine, but insisting on keeping unachievable metrics for Care at Home. After another long caucus, hey ended the day offering two more days to bargain next week, after our strike is scheduled to begin.
The Employer’s lack of movement on any issue of significance indicates to us that Kaiser’s top execs do not believe we can mount a successful strike. They are going to be watching what happens next week on our picket lines very closely. We need to be out in full force to show our determination to win fair and equitable wages and benefits and manageable workloads that will allow us to give our patients the care they deserve. So sign up here for as many picket shifts as you can, using your unique ID.
Also, we would like to have the largest picket line that Kaiser has ever seen at LAMC on Monday. Members from other unions, including UNAC, will be joining us there to show their support. In addition, we will be running shuttle buses to LAMC from all of the other picket locations (except San Diego). If you would like to be part of history and join us at LAMC, respond to the text you received earlier today. Transportation details will be forthcoming.
Summary of our economic proposals today
We revised our economic proposals in five areas:
Incentive Plans – in addition to our previous agreement on metrics for Addiction Medicine, we also agreed to all of the metrics proposed by Kaiser for Social Medicine, with some changes to how these metrics are weighted and minor changes to the target goals. For Psychiatry, we deleted the metric related to return access because KP has not been able to provide us with reliable data on return access. For Care at Home, we proposed that employees receive the average of the Psych, Addiction Medicine and Social Medicine Payouts, since Kaiser refuses to budge on putting forth unrealistic goals.
Bereavement Leave – we are no longer asking for two additional days of paid leave. Rather, we are asking that two additional days of leave be permitted as unpaid or ETO, at the employee’s discretion.
Health & Welfare – We are now asking for MD-visit and Rx co-pays of $10, instead of previously proposed $5.
ETO accruals – We are now proposing that new hires get an additional 5 days of PTO after two years instead of after one year (the current contract is after four years).
Compensation – We are still proposing annual increases to match the coalition raises of 6% for the first year and 5% for each of the 2nd and 3rd years, but have reduced our equity adjustment proposal by a total of 2% over three years. We are also still proposing longevity steps at 20 and 25 years, but have lowered the bump up in wages to 2% for each of these.
Our last bargaining session before the strike is scheduled for Thursday in Glendale. RSVP here if you would like to attend.
