In this issue:

• Incentive pays extended until March 5, 2022
• Weekend Shift Incentive grievance
• Late payment of wages
• Do you wonder if your paycheck is correct?
• New taskforce and committee - members needed
• Presumptive eligibility for workers’ compensation & unemployment insurance
• Did you contract COVID-19 at work? File for workers’ compensation now and retroactively
• Staffing, floating, accepting and rejecting an assignment
• What is a Staffing Complaint/ADO form? Why should I fill one out? How do I fill one out?

Incentive pays extended until March 5, 2022

Spot Pay: Cannot be combine with DTI.

• $30 per hour, all shifts, all departments.
• Applies whenever it is picked up for any portion or all of a shift in all units.

ESI: Extra Shift Incen­tive can be combined with Spot Pay or DTI

• $5 per hour for .6 or greater FTE to pick up extra shift if regular shifts are worked that week.

Weekend Incen­tive: Can be combined with DTI or Spot Pay and/​or ESI

• $600 per extra shift worked on a Saturday and/​or Sunday
• Weekend defined as:
  • 12 hour shifts: Friday Shift 3 through Sunday Shift1
  • 8 hour shifts: Friday Shift 2 through Sunday Shift 2

Prescheduled Call Incentive for Procedural Units: Paid in addition to standby and callback.

• $250 per call shift.

DTI: Double Time Incen­tive cannot be combined with Spot Pay. Can be combined with ESI.

Weekend Shift Incentive grievance

Nurses reported to WSNA their Weekend Incentive pay was not being paid according to what WSNA had bargained with management. Nurses were recording the shifts worked and then management prorated the $600 according to the number of hours worked. We tried to resolve this collaboratively with management. Unfortunately that was not successful, so we filed a grievance. Subsequently, management agreed they had violated our agreement and would make the nurse whole by paying all the nurses who worked a weekend shift from September 3, 2021 through December 11, the difference of what they received and $600.

From Dec. 12, 2021 forward, the $600 weekend incentive will not be offered for shifts less than 8 hours. However, if a nurse accepts a $600 weekend incentive shift of 8 hours or more and then after reporting to work is mandatorily low censused/cut at the behest of management that nurse will still be paid to the full $600 regardless of the actual number of hours worked.

Management paid the affected nurses the additional money on Jan. 7, 2022.

Late payment of wages

It is the employer’s responsibility to pay you the wages you have earned. As individuals, you can file a Workplace Rights Complaint with the Department of Labor and Industries. WSNA cannot file for you. WSNA cannot predict how effective your complaints will be; but if a large number of complaints come from one facility, it should be noticed.

According to the WA State Labor & Industries https://lni.wa.gov/

Employers must pay employees for all work performed. Employers must pay employees an agreed-upon wage on a regular, scheduled payday. If the correct amount of overtime wages cannot be deter­mined until after such regular pay day, the employer may estab­lish a separate pay day for overtime wages; however, the payment of overtime wages may not be delayed for a period longer than that which is reason­ably neces­sary for the employer to compute and arrange for payment of the amount due, and overtime wages must be paid by the regular pay day following the next pay period.

Every employee has the right to file a complaint with L&I and should. Here is the link to electron­i­cally file a complaint: Workplace Rights Complaint (wa​.gov).

Do you wonder if your paycheck is correct?

WSNA nurses have the right to request to meet with HR and have their paychecks reviewed and explained to them how it was paid. This is all because Sonia DaSilva filed a griev­ance when she did not believe she was being paid correctly. WSNA was able to settle the griev­ance with the following agreement:

• The settle­ment agree­ment states: A nurse with a question about the calcu­la­tion of overtime in a specific pay period shall be directed to contact an HR Repre­sen­ta­tive. The HR Repre­sen­ta­tive will then provide the nurse with a copy of the nurse’s Regular Rate Calcu­la­tion Worksheet for the pay period in question. The HR Repre­sen­ta­tive will provide an expla­na­tion of the Employer’s overtime calcu­la­tion method­ology and how the Employer utilized that methodology.

New taskforce and committee members needed

The contract we just ratified allows for committees and a taskforce that need nurses. Below is the contract language specific to each Committee/Taskforce. These positions are paid at your regular rate of pay. Please contact our Nurse Rep Barbara Friesen bfriesen@wsna.org if you are interested in joining one of the teams.

Lactation Room Committee:

Breastfeeding employees may request access to a designated place for the expression of breast milk consistent with Medical Center policy and RCW 43.70.640. Within forty-five (45) days following ratification of the 2021-2024 Agreement, an advisory committee will convene for the purpose of 1) improving the quality of and access to existing lactation rooms in the Medical Center; 2) discussing additional lactation facilities at the Medical Center; and 3) developing communications to managers, supervisors, and break nurses regarding the rights and needs of lactating nurses.

The advisory committee will comprise three (3) bargaining unit registered nurses selected by WSNA, and two or three management and/or HR representatives of the Medical Center’s choosing. The parties will mutually invite an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant to join the committee. The bargaining unit registered nurses will be paid for their time attending meetings of the committee and doing underlying research and work to support the Committee’s goals (time spent in research and work done in support of the committee’s goals will be limited to a total bank of four hours per meeting). The first meeting of the Committee will be set for two (2) hours, and the committee may meet two times thereafter for 60 minutes each.

Parking and Facility Safety Committee:

(For Term of 2021-2024 Agreement) Hospital administration, including a representative of Hospital security, shall, within ninety (90) days of contract ratification, meet with a Parking and Facility Safety Committee of three (3) nurses as appointed by the Association for up to two (2) hours to review concerns regarding parking and facility exterior safety security issues.

The first meeting will include a member of Hospital executive leadership. Thereafter, the Hospital administration shall meet with the WSNA committee bimonthly for two (2) hours each during the first year of the contract. Thereafter, upon request from WSNA, it will meet up to quarterly (for two (2) hours each). The nurses who attend the meetings shall attend on paid time. The committee will review potential solutions to parking and facility safety issues, including but not limited to; maintaining the skybridge as a 24/7 badge entrance, the adequacy of parking escort services and regular security patrols in parking lots/areas especially in hours of darkness, and weapons screening at the Emergency Department entrances. During the term of this 2021-2024 Agreement, the Hospital will not reduce any security measures (such as reopening of the skybridge as a badged entrance and maintaining a security officer on the corner of 19th & J from during the 7 a.m. and 7:00 p.m. shift changes, and on weekdays, from 5:15 a.m. through 7:30 am.) without prior discussion in the Parking and Facility Safety Committee, absent exigent circumstances. The committee will also receive reports from management representatives on their work with local authorities to improve safety in the vicinity of the Hospital campus.

Racial Justice Task Force:

(For Term of 2021-2024 Agreement) Within ninety (90) days of ratification, four (4) bargaining unit nurses selected by WSNA plus the WSNA Nurse Representative, and five (5) representatives from Management will meet to discuss the formation of a Racial Justice Taskforce. Both sides will endeavor to have racially diverse representatives. The Taskforce will meet monthly for 12 months, and then bimonthly, before the Conference Committee; Nurses on the Taskforce will be paid for time spent at Taskforce meetings at the appropriate rate of pay (up to two (2) hours in length each).

The purpose of the Taskforce will be to develop a sustainable infrastructure at the Hospital that addresses and provides solutions and assistance to address myriad racial issues and promote racial justice at, around, and affecting the St. Joseph’s community, patients, and surrounding areas.

The Taskforce will develop a charter which will outline its goals and create a timeline for tasks, including attainable metrics. The Taskforce will initially discuss which other groups, individuals, or representatives should be invited to collaborate with it. In addition, the Taskforce will be represented on any Hospital-wide taskforces or committees dealing with issues of racial justice and diversity, equity, and inclusion.

Within three (3) months of its first meeting, or as soon thereafter as practicable, the Taskforce will have a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (“DEI”) professional (who is not affiliated with either WSNA or CommonSpirit) attend a meeting and provide training and guidance to the Taskforce to assist the group in its mission. The Hospital will pay for this DEI professional. The meeting with the DEI professional will be scheduled for up to six hours, with the Nurse members receiving paid time for the full meeting.

Among the long-term goals the Taskforce will address are:

• Establishing training programs to be on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion issues for managers and employees; with consideration of offering in-person training as soon as safe to do so
• Provide a framework for Hospital employees who have experienced racial discrimination, assaults, or other incidents to receive counseling and support through the Hospital’s resources. (This would not supplant or replace any existing procedures for employees to report incidents or request investigations of discrimination, harassment, or retaliation.)
• How the Hospital can better provide care – and how individual employees can become better providers – for racially diverse patients and its community, given systemic and historic inequities in how under-served communities have received or had access to health care. ● Holiday observances at the Hospital that appropriately reflect the culture and values of the Hospital workforce and the community it serves.
• The Taskforce will establish a designated portal on QuickLinks

Presumptive eligibility for workers’ compensation & unemployment insurance

On Tuesday, May 11, 2021 Governor Jay Inslee signed Senate Bill 5190 into law — which went into effect immedi­ately and provides presump­tive eligi­bility for workers’ compen­sa­tion and unemploy­ment insurance.

In April, the Washington State Legis­la­ture passed the bill, which provides health care workers with presump­tive benefits during a public health emergency. The bill was sponsored by Senator Jeff Holy (R‑Spokane) after he met with WSNA nurses, including our own Shelly Mead, RN, who were told by their employers they didn’t contract COVID-19 on the job; as a result, these nurses were denied benefits like workers’ compen­sa­tion and unemploy­ment insur­ance. Senator Holy worked with WSNA on legis­la­tion to address this problem. Details of the bill include:

• When a nurse or health care worker contracts the illness that is the subject of a state or federal health emergency, it is presumed they got it at work. This presump­tion applies to workers’ compen­sa­tion (for time off work due to illness) and unemploy­ment insur­ance (for time off work due to quarantine).
• The Washington State Depart­ment of Labor & Indus­tries (L&I) decides if a worker quali­fies for workers’ compen­sa­tion — not employers or third-party administrators.
• An employer must have ​“clear and convincing” evidence (the strongest evidence standard in state law) to rebut this presumption.

Presump­tive eligi­bility has already been avail­able to firefighters for certain work-related diseases, as well as workers at the Hanford nuclear site near the Tri-Cities. This new presump­tion for nurses and health care workers recog­nizes the unique hazards we face on the front lines of disease outbreaks while we treat patients who have the illness that is the subject of a state or federal health emergency.

Did you contract COVID-19 at work? File for workers’ compensation now and retroactively

If you were out sick with a COVID-19 infec­tion that you believe was contracted at work, we encourage you to file a workers’ compen­sa­tion claim with L&I. You have two years from the date of the work-related illness to file a claim.

For healthcare workers once a claim is allowed, workers are eligible for medical and disability benefits. Temporary compensation, or time-loss benefits, begins the earliest of the following:

• The first missed work day due to symptoms
• The day the worker was quarantined by a medical provider or public health official
• The day the worker received a positive test result confirming contraction of the infectious or contagious disease.

You can also receive retroactive time-loss back pay, which is especially valuable to nurses who exhausted their paid time off prior to acquiring COVID-19 and were told they had to take unpaid leave.

Even if you were only out of work for a few days, applying for workers’ compen­sa­tion now will give you future coverage, including medical, for any long-hauler or long-term side effects of COVID-19. Once it is deemed a work-related illness and your workers’ compen­sa­tion claim is approved, L&I covers the medical care for life.

VMFHS is self-insured.
To file a workers’ compensation claim at St Joes you need to file a SIF-2, which can be found on the hospital intranet. If you are not at the hospital and cannot access a hospital computer, you can also file through the L&I FileFast .

• If you disagree with how your self-insured claim is being managed, contact L&I at 360-902-6901.
• The Ombudsman for Self-Insured Injured Workers is available to help with self-insured workers' compensation issues. SIOmbuds@Lni.wa.gov.

Staffing, floating, accepting and rejecting an assignment

Nurses at SJMC have now been presented with Contingency and Crisis staffing models and have been told they will need to float to help out other departments. Especially affected areas of the hospital include departments where elective procedures are being cancelled and the staff floated and utilized elsewhere in the hospital. Many of you have valid concerns and questions.

The facility may decide/activate alternate plans when they have insufficient health care personnel and need to implement contingency and/or crisis staffing plans: https://www.doh.wa.gov/Portals/1/Documents/1600/coronavirus/820-217-InterimHCStaffShortage.pdf.

Contingency Capacity Staffing: When staffing shortages are anticipated, healthcare facilities and employers, in collaboration with human resources and occupational health services, should use contingency capacity strategies to plan and prepare for mitigating this problem.

Crisis Capacity Staffing: When staffing shortages occur, healthcare facilities and employers, in collaboration with human resources and occupational health services, may need to implement crisis capacity staffing strategies to continue to provide patient care when there threatens to be insufficient staff to provide safe patient care. Healthcare facilities and employers may choose to implement contingency capacity staffing and crisis capacity staffing independently.”

Our contract is still in effect and states that nurses will be provided orientation and the tools necessary to perform the job. This raises the question of accepting or refusing an assignment which is a difficult topic to discuss and consider for nurses.

Accepting and Rejecting an Assignment

You may have to make a decision about accepting an assign­ment involving abnor­mally dangerous condi­tions that pose an imminent risk to your safety and health and could poten­tially cause serious injury or death. If you are a WSNA member and you accept an abnor­mally dangerous assign­ment, fill out an ADO to document that you are accepting an assign­ment despite objection.

If you have already accepted the assign­ment, your profes­sional license may be at risk if you fail to continue that assign­ment, unless you have handed off the assign­ment and have been relieved of respon­si­bility for the patient. If you decide to refuse the assign­ment, you should remain at the workplace and offer to perform other work that does not pose an imminent risk to your safety and health (e.g., an assign­ment for which you are provided proper safety equip­ment and training).

A decision to refuse an assign­ment could result in disci­pli­nary action taken against you by the employer. Under collec­tive bargaining agree­ments between employers and WSNA, there must be ​“just cause” for any disci­pline. If you are repre­sented by WSNA for collec­tive bargaining, we would defend you if you are subjected to unjust disci­pline, but resolu­tion of any such disci­pline would likely be delayed and the outcome may be uncer­tain as a result of the current national and state emergency declarations.

What is a Staffing Complaint/ADO form? Why should I fill one out? How do I fill one out?

What is a Staffing Complaint/​Assignment Despite Objec­tion (ADO) form?
A Staffing Complaint/​ADO is a form that documents a good faith effort on the part of a nurse to call atten­tion to problems that affect nurse and/​or patient care, safety, or satis­fac­tion. The goal is to fix these problems and ensure they don’t reoccur.

What is the purpose of filling out a Staffing Complaint/​ADO form?
Staffing Complaint/​ADO forms provide documented evidence that a problem exists on a unit and initi­ates a process for improving the situa­tion. Once manage­ment has been presented with an issue, it is incum­bent upon them to address it. Addition­ally, you are documenting the facts, which may be helpful to you if there is a negative outcome.

The submitted Staffing Concern/​ADO also provides the Staffing Committee members with specific details, rather than with anecdotal examples about staffing complaints, and helps them deter­mine if a complaint has been resolved or not. The Staffing Committee has the legal respon­si­bility to deter­mine if staffing complaints are resolved or unresolved. Complaints that show an unresolved trend for 60 days or more could result in an inves­ti­ga­tion by the Depart­ment of Health and possible fines.

When appro­priate, some complaints may be taken to Confer­ence Committee by our WSNA Local Unit officers to try to resolve the concern.

Steps to be taken before filling out a Staffing Complaint/​ADO:

• Clarify what is being asked of you regarding your assignment
• Assess your capabil­i­ties, obsta­cles, acuity of patients, and avail­ability of ancil­lary staff
• Identify all possible options for meeting patient’s needs
• Decide; commu­ni­cate the decision to your Charge Nurse, or immediate super­visor, and document the decision-making process on the form

When to fill out a Staffing Complaint/​ADO:

• When you find yourself in a situa­tion that creates concerns about condi­tions for patients, or for you, complete the form as soon as possible.
• Think of it as an S.O.S. – Short on Safety, Short on Supplies, Short on Staff

Examples of when you should submit a Staffing Complaint/​ADO form:

• Your unit is not staffed according to its staffing plan.
• Shift adjust­ments to staffing are inadequate.
• Charge nurse is unable to perform charge nurse duties, secondary to increased patient care assignment
• Inade­quate nurse to patient ratios for patient acuity based on your clinical judgment; insuf­fi­cient support staff
• You are not trained or experi­enced in the area assigned, or have not been oriented to this unit / case load
• Neces­sary equip­ment is not avail­able (supplies, IVs, medica­tion avail­ability), or you are not trained or experi­enced to use equip­ment in assigned area
• An assign­ment poses a threat to the health and safety of a patient under your direct care
• Coerced/​Mandatory overtime, or missed breaks

New in our contract:
When a clinical manager or other supervisor discusses a staffing complaint form (such as an ADO or similar form) with the nurse who made the report, the nurse may arrange to bring another nurse from their department with them to this discussion, which will be held during both nurses’ working time. The clinical manager’s response to the staffing complaint form will be provided to the Staffing Committee. Neither the complaint form nor any response from the manager/supervisor will be placed in the nurse’s personnel file.

No retaliation!
Our WSNA contract and the law both prohibit retaliation against nurses for filing a staffing complaint/ADO. If you experience retaliation notify one of our WSNA Local Unit Officers or Nurse Rep immediately.

Questions? Contact your WSNA Nurse Repre­sen­ta­tive Barbara Friesen at bfriesen@wsna.org or 206 – 575-7979 ext. 3056.