UFCW ready to strike Kaiser

PORTLAND, OR -- Some 250 imaging technicians at Kaiser Permanente will walk off the job at 6 a.m. Wednesday, Aug. 6, if they don't have a new collective bargaining agreement to vote on.

It is the second announcement of a strike at the giant health maintenance organization in July.

Four weeks ago some 2,200 members of Service Employees Local 49 were 12 hours away from a strike when a tentative agreement was reached. They ultimately rejected the proposal and have returned to the bargaining table. The next round of talks are scheduled for Monday, Aug. 4. Rob Kroder, a business representative of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 555, which represents the imaging technicians, said a federal mediator has called for a negotiating session on Tuesday, Aug. 5, a day before the scheduled strike.

"This is typical of Kaiser," he said. "You have to give them strike notice before they will bargain seriously."

Gene Pronovost, president of the 17,000-member Tigard-based Local 555, said imaging technicians at Kaiser have been bargaining for over 10 months and "this escalation was forced by the employer's demands for benefit reductions."

The old contract expired Oct. 31, 1996.

Local 555 is seeking the same contract package that its pharmacy technicians ratified last January. That settlement, too, was reached just hours before UFCW scheduled a walkout.

"Our hope was that the imaging technicians would follow along the trail we blazed with pharmacy," said Kroder. "But Kaiser is putting us through the same dog and pony show."

In dispute are wages and health benefits. Kaiser is demanding that employee medical benefits be reduced by instituting both higher point-of-service fees and monthly cost-sharing. Kaiser is also insisting that most employees in the bargaining group accept wage freezes.

UFCW said it will picket the largest imaging centers among Kaiser's 21 facilities from Longview to Salem. Imaging services include X-ray, MRI, CAT scan, mammography, ultrasound, EKGs and EEGs.

SEIU Local 49, which represents licensed practical nurses, medical and dental assistants, home health aides, appointment secretaries, cooks, housekeepers, van drivers, couriers, orderlies, shipping clerks and others, overwhelmingly rejected a proposed four-year contract that called for an 11 percent wage increase, but also included increasingly higher co-payments for health care insurance, point-of-service fees and retirement takeaways.

"We had some very vocal meetings, and our people are just fed up," said Shelley Herochik, field services coordinator for Local 49.

She said a key sticking point has been working conditions. "Our people are understaffed and overworked," Herochik said. "The underlying issue is that the quality of care at Kaiser is being undermined. These are longtime employees who have seen their workloads increasing year after year to the point that they can't perform their jobs like they used to."

Herochik said Local 49 has informed its members of the strike notice issued by Local 555 and "wants to support UFCW in any we we can."