Adventist Nursing Home, union negotiate over contract - The Business Review (Albany):

hustbelogehy1857.blogspot.com
and local 1199 of the Service EmployeeswInternational Union, are in "heavyh negotiations" over a The union, which threatened a strikew in mid-November, wants a contract by Dec. 18. But Bill the administrator of the nursing home said thatwas "kind of an artificial deadline." The two sides have been talking abourt a number of non-economivc issues, including seniority and requiring employees to belonhg to the union, but have not yet started talking about pay, McGregoe said. Mindy Berman, a spokeswoman for local 1199 SEIU, said the two sidee have been meeting regularly since The union threatened to stagea three-day striks starting Nov.
18, but withdres the 10-day strike notice when negotiationalooked promising, Berman said. "When they withdrew the strikwe notice weappreciated it," McGregorr said. While nursing home management doesn't feel the need to reacbh a final dealby Dec. 18, he has been meetinf with the union several timesxa week, McGregor said. The 120-bed nursinb home is affiliated withthe Seventh-day Adventist In May, employees at the religiouds nursing home voted 84 to 17 to be representedr by 1199 SEIU, which has 220,000 members. Adventist has facedd tough times because of limits on reimbursementt for Medicaid and Medicare and the overall accordingto McGregor.
The nursinf home has not been able to make pension payments to workers as it normallhy does because ofthe economy. That happenerd once before and eventually the nursing home madethoser payments. His goal is to make the overdue payments when it iseconomicallt feasible, McGregor said. The nursing home was also forced to make layoffx for thesame reasons, he said. Adventist nursing home employs 150 people at its Rout9 facility. The negotiations at Adventistf are part of a continuinfg effort by 1199 SEIU to unionize nursinb homes inthe N.Y. region, Berman said.