Pennsylvania Association of Staff Nurses and Allied Professionals

History

The bargaining units which comprise PASNAP were originally organized in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s by the Pennsylvania Nurses Association (PNA). However, the majority of PNA's members remained managers (and unable to form a labor union under the National Labor Relations Act) or associate members outside formal collective bargaining units.

Unionized members of PNA became increasingly dissatisfied with the poor representation and low militancy of the nurses association. In 1994, the Pennsylvania State Education Association (PSEA) raided PNA's private-sector and Temple University Health System bargaining units. SEIU District 1199P raided PNA in 1997, taking over a large unit of state-employed nurses and health professionals. Never eager to engage in collective bargaining, PNA voluntarily shed its remaining collective bargaining unit (composed of nurses in the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education) by holding an election in which the nurses agreed to affiliate with the Office and Professional Employees International Union.

The bargaining units which affiliated with PSEA became known as PSEA HealthCare. But the nurses proved restive under PSEA's leadership as well. Seeking to retain their affiliation, PSEA HealthCare sought dual affiliation with a union better able to provide collective bargaining representation as well as expertise in professional issues. PSEA and PSEA HealthCare leaders agreed to dually affiliate the nursing division with the Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals (FNHP), the health care division of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT).

The nurses, however, remained restless under the leadership of PSEA. A number of local union leaders within PSEA HealthCare felt the nurses should disaffiliate from PSEA and form an independent union. At a national meeting of unionized nurses sponsored by the California Nurses Association (CNA) in March 2000, CNA staff approached PSEA HealthCare leaders and suggested forming an independent nurses association associated (but not affiliated) with CNA. Many of the PSEA nurse leaders were receptive to the idea. Although the executive board of PSEA HealthCare approved the dual affiliation with the AFT, 12 local unions (primarily located in southeastern Pennsylvania) held their own meeting on May 24, 2000, and disaffiliated from PSEA. PSEA brought the issue before the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). In October 2000, in what was described as a Solomonic decision because it "split the difference," the Pittsburgh region of the NLRB ruled that each local union was free to do as it wished. Seven bargaining units with about 1,000 members became dual affiliates of AFT and PSEA. This organization became known as HealthCare PSEA. The 12 other bargaining units, with a membership of about 3,500, formed PASNAP. The PASNAP nurses hired Bill Cruice, a lawyer and former organizer with the Health Professionals and Allied Employees (an AFT affiliate), as the organization's executive director.

PASNAP formed its alliance with the CNA, and modeled its organizational structure on that of CNA as well.

Collective bargaining

PASNAP has proven to be one of the most militant nurses unions in Pennsylvania, striking or threatening to strike numerous times in its short history as an independent union. The union led a 23-day nurses' strike in the winter of 2003, one of Pennsylvania's longest health care walkouts. In April 2010 the union led a month-long strike at Temple University Hospital defeating many hospital demands, including one banning nurses from making public critiques of management policies related to patient care. The union led a 24-hour strike against the Tennessee based Community Health Systems in December 2010 in Wilkes Barre while the threat of a second strike on May Day 2010 later backed the for profit company off of major healthcare concessions and anti union demands.

PASNAP is also recognized for its aggressive collective bargaining, which has won union members significantly higher wages and improved working conditions. The union's more notable collective bargaining achievements include:

Organizing

PASNAP's initial organizing efforts were not successful. The union formed a loose association with SEIU 1199P to organize workers wall-to-wall at hospitals near existing collective bargaining units or which provided enhanced collective bargaining power to existing locals. The union's first organizing campaign was among a unit of 252 licensed practical nurses (LPNs), and two units of other workers (47 business office workers and 140 technical and professional workers), at Wyoming Valley Hospital. SEIU attempted to organize the service and maintenance employees. Management asked The Burke Group, a notorious anti-union consultant, to advise the hospital on strategy and tactics. The LPNs rejected the union by a mere six votes, leading PASNAP leaders to decry what they saw as "widespread illegal behavior on the part of the employer." PASNAP entered into contract negotiations with the hospital. But three years later, the technical and professional workers decertified the union when no contract was signed.

PASNAP did not attempt to organize another collective bargaining unit until 2005. The union's next foray into organizing was a small one. In July 2005, the union organized 17 nurses, nurse practitioners and physician assistants at the Delaware County, Pennsylvania, George W. Hill Correctional Facility. In March 2006, the union organized a small unit of 40 registered nurses and technicians at Wills Eye Surgical Center in Philadelphia.

The union quickly expanded its organizing program. In May 2007, 275 registered nurses at Jeanes Hospital (a member of the Temple University Health System) voted to join PASNAP. On July 19, 2007, 400 nurses at Community Medical Center in Scranton voted overwhelmingly to join PASNAP. The election was the largest nurses' organizing victory in Pennsylvania since over 700 registered nurses at Altoona Regional Health System joined SEIU two months earlier. In June 2009 nurses and other healthcare professionals at Fair Acres Geriatric Center voted 125 to 70 in favor of joining PASNAP.

In 2013 Nurses at Armstrong County Memorial Hospital near Pittsburgh, a bargaining unit that had originally decided to stay with PSEA during the split in 2000 and now frustrated with the poor representation and lack of militancy of PSEA, aggressively petitioned to join PASNAP. The nurses voted 200 to 30 to join PASNAP with 4 voting for no union. Soon afterwards, unrepresented technical and professional employees at the same hospital petitioned to join PASNAP. Encouraged by the presence of the new union, the previously non union workers voted 82-27 to join PASNAP.

Union organizing from PASNAP most recently affected Einstein Medical Center Philadelphia. In a narrow vote margin (54%-46%), PASNAP successfully formed a union amongst staff nurses who voted in favor. The hospital and PASNAP engaged in negotiations which have moved toward an accepted contract. PASNAP had been accused of aggressive, dishonest recruitment tactics where staff nurse interest was misrepresented by PASNAP to other staff nurses in an attempt to feign wide spread acceptance and therefore appear as though PASNAP was generally accepted. The hospital was accused by PASNAP of misrepresenting financial information.

Legislative and Nursing Practice Activity

PASNAP has been very active politically since its inception. It began pressing for an end to mandatory overtime in 2001, and drafted a bill which was introduced in the Pennsylvania General Assembly banning the practice in acute-care hospitals in 2002. The union has been able to get the measure reintroduced in each successive legislative session.

PASNAP, and unions in general, will be directly affected by National Right to Work laws. If Pennsylvania were to become a RTW state, PASNAP would risk losing dues paying members as well as "free riders" because these members would have a choice of union membership or not. This differs currently in Pennsylvania because all members of the collective bargaining group are forced to join a union, despite personal beliefs. This is termed "forced unionism". Currently, unions have the option of allowing "free riders" to represent themselves according to national labor laws and therefore not belong or pay dues. Overwhelmingly, unions do not exercise this option so as to "force unionism" and therefore increase revenue.

As part of its campaign to end mandatory overtime, the union has repeatedly polled Pennsylvania nurses about their hours, the acuity (level of illness) of their patients, and patient load. In 2001, the union's independently-conducted poll of 6,000 registered nurses in the state found that 56 percent of nurses would enter the profession today due to mandatory overtime and poor nurse-to-patient staffing ratios. At the time, the poll was the largest survey of RNs ever conducted in Pennsylvania. In 2004, a second poll of more than 2,500 registered nurses in the southeastern Pennsylvania region found that nearly one in three nurses planned to quit nursing within the next five years due to long working hours.

The bill eventually passed the statehouse and went into effect on July 1, 2009. The bill mandating nurse to patient ratios is now the main focus on the union.