HARTFORD — Nursing home caregivers represented by the New England Health Care Employees Union, District 1199 SEIU, voted in favor of a new strike deadline in 20 facilities, effective June 3rd, according to a release by the union.
According to 1199 SEIU, the workers are demanding additional funding in the state budget to cover wage raises industry-wide for the next two years. Workers have been operating with expired contracts for the past two years and did not receive an increase in salary for 2016 and 2017. The union says workers received a 2% raise in 2018 which amounted to about 30 cents for most workers. According to the union, if the current state budget proposal is approved, they will not see any raise to their pay in 2019 and 2020.
“More than 2,500 nursing home caregivers will be forced to walk out of their jobs until proper funding is provided to raise their take-home pay,” said Rob Baril, president of SEIU 1199 New England. “This is the last resort for workers who care dearly about the residents and patients they serve every day. Some of our members are making as little as $10.93 per hour or just 83 cents above the bare minimum wage. This is totally unacceptable in a wealthy state like Connecticut.”
The union says after they received an encouraging letter two weeks ago from Gov. Lamont asking for room to negotiate, workers withdrew the previous notice of intent to strike sent to Connecticut nursing homes, which was effective on May 1st.
1199 SEIU represents 26,000 health care workers in Connecticut. Some 7,000 members are nursing home workers classified as registered nurses, licensed practical nurses, certified nursing assistants, maintenance, receptionists, recreation and dietary staff.
Read the full release below.
The union lists the following nursing homes that will be affected:
Nine ICare facilities
Bidwell
Westside
Silver Springs
Farmington
Chelsea Place
Trinity Hill
Wintonbury
Kettlebrook
Chestnut
Four Autumn facilities
New Britain
Waterbury
Norwalk
Cromwell
Two National facilities
Bloomfield Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation
MapleView Health & Rehabilitation Center
Additional five facilities
Windsor Health and Rehabilitation Center
Advanced Center Nursing & Rehabilitation
West Hartford Health & Rehabilitation Center
Orange
JACC Norwich
