Included in this union news you’ll find the following:

• Temporary WSNA Nurse Rep Change
• Leadership Wrap Up
• Officer + committee nominations
• Tips for filing Unsafe Staffing Complaints
• Quick BSN update

Temporary Nurse Rep Changes Beginning Monday May 4, 2026!

Our current WSNA Nurse Rep Alle Machorro will be out for maternity leave beginning Monday May 4, 2026! It’s been a pleasure to represent you all through our recent bargaining and look forward to seeing you all in late October!

Our bargaining unit will have 2 nurse representatives covering - Ed Zercher and Jaclyn Smedley. Nurses who currently have active grievances and any nurse that believes the contract is being violated either through inappropriate discipline or articles in our contract, please contact Ed at ezercher@wsna.org. For all other questions, concerns, or issues related to Sacred Heart, please email Jaclyn at jsmedley@wsna.org.

Leadership Wrap Up

Our WSNA Leadership convention wrapped up this past weekend, and we had amazing representation from our Spokane region! Local nurse officers and stewards attended this convention gaining valuable skills and training in areas including local leadership, how to be a steward, how to sit for investigation meetings with HR and so much more! Our union regularly offers opportunities for our nurses to get involved with costs typically covered. Contact us if you’re interested in getting more involved.

Officer and Committee Nominations 

All our local officer positions are currently open for nomination with elections to follow! We are also accepting nominations for our committees including nurse practice, workplace violence, and benefits. Our union and our contract are only as strong as the nurses willing to engage and speak up on behalf of it. If you or someone you know would be interested in getting more involved, fill out a nomination today! Position descriptions and committee descriptions are included on the nomination form. Committee appointments will be made by the officer team. Nominations close May 6, 2026, with a ballot election to follow for officer positions.

Helpful tips to help our Hospital Staffing Committee

Every staffing committee meeting is an opportunity for our team to understand how the Employer is interpreting our staffing law. At the April Staffing Committee for example, a director of nursing disagreed that a nurse having 8 patients was unsafe because the unit’s total staffing number appeared to be over the minimum that the plan called for. What we learned is that though the nurses are reporting being forced to use the break buddy system and care for 8 patients, the Employer is not inclined to call that unsafe if the unit is meeting its plan.

What can we do? 

Increase our own understanding of the law and report smarter! What we do know is the Employer IS using a break buddy system. When a nurse clocks out for their meal period, they are not providing break nurses which inherently lowers the minimum number of nurses available to the unit. THIS is the language we’d like our nurses to focus on when they are reporting unsafe staffing. Our complaints should include the following information when possible-

• Include the census, required minimum staffing standards from the staffing plan and the actual staffing levels. This is critical information. The law does not address ratios, so including complaint information that talks about the number of patients assigned to one nurse isn’t essential. If your plan requires 9 nurses and you only have 8 because someone clocked out for their break, give those numbers.
  • Nurses can include in their complaints that the number of nurses providing direct patient care is less than the required staffing during meal and rest breaks and we do not use break nurses

We know nurses don’t always know how best to write these complaints but including the above information will be essential to help our committee evaluate whether there is patterned break buddy use and those complaints should be unresolved and investigated by the Department of Health. Complaints that are unresolved for 60 days will be investigated by the Department of Health.

Remember: Break buddies are not safe, our patients deserve better. Multiple hospitals in Washington state are already and have been using break nurses. Why do our patients and staff deserve anything less?

New BSN Premium Update

We reached out to HR as many nurses have questions about how to upload their BSN. In short, nurses need to know there is not a confirmed method or data validation in place yet for WSNA. Nurses who have uploaded a BSN, will be required to upload it again once those have been established. We have asked the Employer to provide us with the appropriate information to disseminate along with what qualifies for proof of education and what to do if a nurse’s last name is different on their degree than they are employed.

We’ll get you this information as soon as we have it but just know- if you found a way to upload your BSN, you will likely be required to do it again.

Questions? Reach out to one of your local union officers or one of the Nurse Representatives listed above for coverage!