Deal is done!!!

4:56pm, Friday. We just got to a tentative agreement with management. Bargaining is done, champagne is uncorked, let the celebration begin.

Next step: start organizing meetings where we can explain the contract to our members, and hopefully get to a vote in a few weeks. One problem is that the next Board of Trustees meeting is November 22, and that’s where the contract gets ratified by the Board. Looks like we have our work cut out for us.

Thanks for all your support during the last few months. See you at the vote!

And the verdict is......another bargaining date!

We’ve just finished meeting with management tonight (8:45pm). No deal yet, but we’re close. We’re going to hold out for an improvement on management’s sick leave program and give them something concrete for wages. The numbers are close, and both sides understand each other’s position.

Our next—and hopefully final, for real this time—meeting will be Friday, November 4, from 1pm until whenever (most likely no later than 5pm). Location to be determined.

Management shows us the money (kind of).

Management actually came back with a wage counterproposal at 6:42pm tonight. And the numbers aren’t too far off. It’s being linked to us accepting management’s proposed change on the sick leave program (which is an improvement over what we have now), but there are still some issues with their proposal. And, honestly, even without asking for more money, we still need to revise their proposal to allocate money to places where our members want it most. 

We’ve currently signed off, or are close to signing off, on the last of around twenty-five proposals. Wages and sick leave are left, and we’ve now waded into the weeds on it. We’re prepared to stay tonight as long as we need to.

Unfortunately, management has already told us that any counterproposal we offer will have to be reviewed by management’s bean counters before they accept it, or make a counter themselves. Bottom line: we need another day to get to a deal. Hopefully this week. I’ll update as more information becomes available.

The clock is still ticking, ticking....

Management just left. For the third straight meeting, it looks like we’re not going to get any financial proposal back from them, and then we’re going to have to meet another time. There’s still time for them to get their shit together and give us—oh, I don’t know—an actual proposal in writing that we can work from. But the clock is ticking on this particular bargaining session.

If nothing is forthcoming later today, your bargaining team is going to gird our loins and ramp up the pressure on management. You heard it hear first.

As the day wears on....

It’s 5:30pm, and my coworkers have all gone home. And here I am with the bargaining team! I’ve been at Highland since 7:00am, seeing patients in the morning, then rushing off to bargaining at 12:30pm (while intermittently answering pages during the day; my colleague who would normally be covering for me is on vacation, but was nice enough to come in for the afternoon to allow me to be at the table. Thanks Jenn!). It would be nice if we were close to being done.

We’re waiting for management to return, and we’ll be getting just about everything NOT about money off the table. That includes the clinical ladder, the new Patient Care Committees, a weekend-only pilot program for JGPP, tweaking of the shift differential language to better reflect actual practices, and some other minor things. Money is a big thing, and the sick leave thing we’re looking forward to having some minor improvements. Here’s hoping that a deal gets done soon.

Management is coming back in the room right now. Oh boy oh boy oh boy oh boy…..

The Final Countdown.

Okay, this time for real.....we’re meeting again today, and hopefully this will be the last meeting. Last time, management left us hanging. They didn’t have the information they needed to get back to us on the key remaining issues, and we spent a lot of time waiting around for them.

This time, we’re committed to getting this done today, and we’re not leaving until the deal is done (or until they make us leave). We’ll be in Classroom B, starting around noon and going until.....well, you get the idea. If you have a moment, stop by and witness your bargaining team in action. We always appreciate the support of the members we represent.

Meeting again today, deal could be close.

We’re meeting again today, and hopefully this will be the last meeting. Most of our issues have been dealt with, and if they haven’t actually been signed off as tentative agreements, they’re about to be.

There are two big issues—some might call them the biggest—that we hope to finish today: sick leave and wages. We’ve already made our proposals to management, and hopefully we’re going to hear back from them. If we’re not too far apart on those two things, the deal could get done today.