Valley Independent Sentinel

AND THE STRIKE DRAGGED ON

by Eugene Driscoll and Nina Leff | Jul 20, 2010 11:29 am

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Posted to: Ansonia, Derby

Kartisha Hall is angry.

She has been on strike for three months. She is facing the loss of her health care coverage. She has doubts about her unemployment benefits. And two weeks ago, she was standing outside in 100-plus degree heat.

Hall was one of about 15 workers on the picket line outside Birmingham Health Center earlier this month.

They — along with a few hundred other workers across the state, including those at Hilltop Health Center in Ansonia — have been on strike since April 15.

The next round of negotiations was scheduled for last Wednesday — but workers interviewed doubted those talks would amount to much of anything.

They were right.

Spectrum Healthcare, the Vernon company that owns the nursing homes, won’t budge on contract talks, according to union officials.

The union says the owners won’t talk about a return-to-work agreement or a better five-year contract.

Spectrum Healthcare officials, though, said the union leaders have unreasonable demands — especially given the poor health of the nation’s economy.

The workers said they expected this strike to last two weeks, at most. Patience is starting to wear thin.

“Let’s get in there, get the contracts and stop playing games,” said James Cooks, a Birmingham worker for 14 years.

Swaying Local Leaders

In addition to the gatherings on the picket lines in Ansonia and Derby, the workers have been taking their case to local governments.

The Ansonia Board of Aldermen passed a resolution in June urging Spectrum Healthcare to go back to the bargaining table. Spectrum officials, after the resolution was passed, said the company never left the bargaining table.

This month, about 20 striking workers appeared at Derby City Hall twice. They’re trying to convince the Derby Board of Aldermen to pass a resolution calling for an end to the strike.

The workers were referred to a subcommittee of the Board of Aldermen, who were supposed to consider a resolution and them make a recommendation back to the full board.

The subcommittee met two weeks ago in Derby City Hall, where the nursing home workers told the Derby elected officials they live in the Valley — and that they need help.

Derby resident and nursing home worker Janice Stonoha said she used to work at Lifetouch on Derby’s Main Street.

“When Lifetouch shut, down Mayor Staffieri said he would help us. Well now I need the help,” Stonoha said.

Alex Lopez, a union organizer, said Spectrum wants to tie their employees’ wage increases to the Medicare reimbursement rate. He said that simply isn’t fair, as workers — already underpaid — could go years without a raise.

Ken Hughes, president of the Derby Board of Aldermen, said the resolution the union workers wanted Derby officials to endorse was heavily slanted toward the union’s side.

He suggested the Board of Aldermen be given an edited resolution, one that simply called for both sides to sit down and end the strike.

Instead, the Aldermen subcommittee voted to send the entire resolution to the full board for debate. The next Aldermen meeting is scheduled for Thursday.

Larger Efforts

As workers appear at local government meetings, the union’s state-wide leaders have been pressing their case in the court of public opinion.

In addition to several large rallies at the state capitol — and one last week at Gov. M. Jodi Rell’s residence in Hartford — 1199 union spokesperson Deborah Chernoff last week notified local media about a $24,000 fine recently leveled by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration against Hilltop in Ansonia.

The OSHA document is as follows. Article continues after the document.

OSHA LETTER

Spectrum Responds

Sean Murphy, Spectrum’s chief financial officer, said the OSHA issues have been dealt with and the company is appealing the fine.

Murphy said the union’s efforts to portray the nursing homes as unsafe “is really just a distraction.”

“Essentially, the union leadership made an ill-advised decision to take their members out on strike,” Murphy said.

Murphy said the union and the company were close to an agreement that would have seen the workers get a 2.5 percent wage increase.

“And they went on strike, when there’s 175,000 people out of work in Connecticut right now,” he said. “They are aware that nursing homes are largely funded by the state and that nursing homes haven’t received an increase in funding since July 2008. It certainly doesn’t look like there are going to be any increases in the future.”

When asked if there’s an end in sight for the strike, Murphy said:

“Labor disputes always come to an end. I just don’t see how this one does at this point.”

The striking workers in Ansonia and Derby, meanwhile, have been braving triple-digit temperatures in recent weeks. Some in Derby huddled under trees. Others under a tend. Ice, bottled water and spray fans were the tools of the day.

“We stand strong. We’re going nowhere,” said Loriette Thompson, a worker at Birmingham.

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