Get your walking shoes ready. When we left bargaining last night; the hospital said they would look at everything and prepare a comprehensive package to present to us today with an eye toward reaching a deal. We started the day thinking we’d be at the bargaining table late into the night hammering out language that improves our staffing levels, expanding break relief, and finalizing per diem requirements in exchange for just cause protections. 

That’s... not how things played out. 

Instead, we waited several hours for a proposal that was disappointing at best and insulting at worst. Here are the lowlights of what management presented to us:

• Zero protection of the status quo full-time benefits for 0.75 FTEs
• No penalty or other enforcement mechanism that truly protects charge nurses from having to take a patient assignment
• Break coverage takeaways that backtrack from our current contract’s commitment to phase out break buddies over the life of the contract by giving management license to use break buddies as standard practice. Management refused to admit that they violate the staffing plan every time a nurse hands their patient care assignment to a break buddy for relief. They also blamed sick calls and other last-minutes shortages for the lack of break coverage, but didn’t even try to justify the lack of pre-scheduled break relief nurses in units hospital-wide. (They know as well as we do: they rely on break buddies because we’re understaffed.)  
• Wage increases that actually fall below their previous proposal for everyone at Step 10 and above. WSNA’s proposal would have led the market – management’s would put us behind from the start and keep us there.
• No movement on just cause protections for per diem nurses. Despite demanding significant commitments from per diems, management still refuses to commit to the fair, common sense job protections these nurses deserve.
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We had a heated exchange with management over their refusal to comply – or even meaningfully engage with – our state’s staffing law. Instead, they want to wait to see how the DOH interprets this law, despite having had over three years to figure out what this law requires of them and how to follow it.  

The biggest takeaway: they don’t intend to staff the hospital according to our approved staffing plan on every unit, every day, throughout every shift unless the DOH or L&I make them. 

Nurses are done waiting – it's time to take action. 

Informational Picket Pledge

We need to escalate, and our next step is an informational picket that takes our fight to the public. Obviously, management doesn’t want to move on any of their proposals, but they do care about the hospital’s reputation across the Pacific Northwest. An informational picket will get more eyes on all the problems we’re trying to fix in the hospital and put pressure on them to come to the table in good faith. Our patients and community deserve to hear exactly what management is trying to take away. And we’ll be in the streets to tell them!

To make that happen, we need nurses to commit to coming to the picket! The more people outside the hospital, the more impactful our picket gets to be. So, the bargaining team and Contract Action Team will be going around the hospital with a pledge to sign and some “ready to walk” stickers. Reach out and sign it as soon as you can!

The bargaining team is fired up and invite everyone to join us as we keep fighting and standing up for a fair contract.

What’s Next? 

We’ve agreed to a short contract extension through October 16, 2026, to give management another opportunity to change its tune before we hit the streets. We’re still confirming a specific bargaining date, but we’ll update you as soon as we know more. 

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