Striking nursing home workers reach tentative agreement
Striking Pennsylvania nursing home employees, including those at The Grove at Washington, have reached a tentative agreement with Comprehensive Healthcare and Priority Healthcare, the nurses’ union SEIU Healthcare announced Friday.
Hundreds of nursing home workers who spent more than a week on picket lines across the state paused their strike Friday to discuss and vote on ratifying new contracts.
Strikes began throughout the state Sept. 2, when nearly 700 nursing home employees walked off the job to fight for better staffing, better wages and better healthcare.
Employees also demanded that the millions of dollars in state and federal funding be put toward staffing and resident care at Comprehensive- and Priority-owned nursing homes. Employees at 14 Comprehensive and Priority facilities said they are burned out due to understaffing, increasing risks for residents of those facilities.
The nurses strike continued through Labor Day weekend, when employees sporting purple SEIU Healthcare T-shirts marched in the Pittsburgh Labor Day parade to bring awareness to their cause.
On Thursday, staff at Priority Healthcare’s Meadows at Gettysburg and Meadows at Camp Hill, which planned to join in the strike Friday, announced they had made progress on a contract agreement and would not be walking off the job.
Later that day, nursing home staff at Comprehensive-owned facilities, including The Grove, announced they, too, had reached a tentative agreement with the company, and would pause their strike.
As of press time Friday, 13 of the 14 striking facilities had reached tentative contract agreements.
Some striking nursing home staff hosted member meetings on picket lines Friday to discuss the new contract ahead of the vote that same day, Karen Applegate Gownley, communications director for SEIU Healthcare, said in an email.
“While the ratification process continues, workers will be able to return to their jobs over the weekend,” Gownley said, noting the voting process would continue over the weekend.
Details of the agreement will not be released until the contract has been approved.