Nurses at three Legacy hospitals are seeking to unionize with the Oregon Nurses Association (ONA). Nurses delivered a petition for voluntary recognition to Legacy executives on Jan. 6.
The proposed bargaining unit of 2,260 registered nurses at three Legacy hospitals — around 600 at Good Samaritan, 1,050 at Emanuel, and 600 at Randall Children’s Hospital — is the largest organizing effort for nurses in ONA’s history.
Nurses involved in the campaign said patient and worker safety are their main concerns.
Kathryn Bailey, a nurse in the neurotrauma intensive care unit at Emanuel, said her unit often doesn’t meet Oregon’s legal staffing minimums. Unionizing would help nurses get more enforcement of staffing laws, more competitive wages, and better work environments to help recruit and retain more nurses, Bailey said.
ONA chief of staff Scott Palmer said nurses at Legacy have been working to unionize for decades, but past efforts at the three hospitals never made it this far.
Around 360 nurses at Legacy Mount Hood Medical Center, one of Legacy’s seven hospitals, unionized in April 2023. The July 2023 shooting death of a security guard at Legacy Good Samaritan sparked a march and rally over longstanding safety concerns. In a survey by National Nurses United, more than a third of nurses reported they had been physically assaulted in the past year.
Dondee Murray, a nurse at Good Samaritan, said some safety improvements were made after the shooting, but she still feels afraid at times walking through the parking garage and hospital during night shifts.
In August 2023, Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU) announced plans to acquire Legacy in a merger. OHSU nurses are represented by ONA. Uncertainty about what the merger will mean for workers and patients contributed to the union push.
“We just want to make sure that when it goes through, that we’re able to have a seat at the table, much like our OHSU colleagues, so we can all work together,” Emanuel emergency department nurse Sarah Zavala said.
