Cascade Valley Security Officers and MSWs - Bargaining Update

On December 12, we had our first bargaining session for Security Officers and MSWs where we made a lot of great progress with seniority language for both groups and received a wage proposal for Security Officers which strengthened our position on wage parity.

Our team met again with the Employer at the bargaining table on January 4 for our second bargaining session. While the Employer made significant movement on wages for Security Officers, they rejected our other proposals around daily overtime, compensation, and safety. We remain united and continued to firmly push back on the employer's proposals. We gave compelling testimony about working conditions and we feel confident that the Employer will consider our testimony when they respond to our proposal on January 18.

The further we go, the more confident we are in the process. It felt great to be given the opportunity to vocalize our concerns around staffing and workload and the reality of the situation. Having a voice in our workplace is powerful.
—Our Bargaining Team: Lisa Warriax – MSW; Carl Ramirez – Security Officer

We will meet the employer back at the table on January 18 and are ready to continue our fight for fair wages and a safe workplace.

Cascade Valley Security Officers and MSWs - Successful First Day—More Dates Scheduled

BARGAINING TEAM: Carl Ramirez (Security Officer), Lisa Warriax (MSW)

“We received a wage proposal which gives us hope that Cascade Valley wants to engage in productive talks with us. We will keep going forward from here!”

Early this year we won our union election for Security Officers and MSWs. Our bargaining team met in the Fall and drafted proposals which would achieve parity with Skagit Regional, increase retention, and bolster recruitment efforts.

On December 12 we had our first bargaining session with the Cascade Valley’s management and had a successful day. Our proposal is for the existing Cascade Valley collective bargaining agreement to extend to security officers and MSWs. In addition, we proposed wage scales and other compensation for both classifications. Throughout an intense day of negotiations, we’ve already made headway, particularly in refining seniority language for both groups and establishing wage guidelines for Security Officers. Recognizing the significance of seniority in scenarios like job applicant tiebreakers, layoffs, and scheduling, we succeeded in establishing that our original date of hire with Cascade Valley would serve as our seniority date.

In our pursuit of equitable treatment, we firmly pushed back against the Employer’s proposals and stand united in advocating for wage parity. The battle for parity will continue in our upcoming sessions scheduled for January 4 and 18.

Providence St. Peter Hospital PTAs / COTAs Bargaining Update

“Unfortunately Providence rejected our proposal to place employees on a wage scale per their years of experience in their job classification. Having our years of experience recognized is a top priority!”—Cynthia Miner and Heidi Ranger

Our Union Bargaining Team met with Management on Thursday, June 29 to discuss the terms of our accretion into the technical unit represented by UFCW 3000. Thus far we have not been able to come to an agreement with Management about the structure of our wage scale and retaining greater continuing education benefits than the minimum required in the technical unit’s union contract.

As such, we are scheduled to meet with them again August 15. While we wish this were possible sooner, we also could not accept the offer on the table just for the sake of expediting the process.