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United Steelworkers (USW) voted overwhelmingly yesterday to ratify a contract with Appalachian Regional Healthcare, ending a 25-day strike against the giant medical system that operates nine hospitals and 11 clinics in West Virginia and Kentucky.
The vote clears the way for 2,700 certified nurse aides, licensed practical nurses, housekeepers, maintenance and clerical workers to return to work as early as tomorrow. ARH agreed to recall employees by seniority and furlough any not immediately needed so that they may collect unemployment benefits.
USW and ARH reached a tentative settlement late Saturday night. In the three-year agreement, the defined-benefit pension is secured for all USW employees, wages are to rise twice each year, and increases in employee contributions to health insurance premiums are limited.
“This vote allows our members to return to what they do best – providing the finest patient care in all of Appalachia while earning decent wages and knowing their future is secured by a pension,” said Ernest R. “Billy” Thompson, director of USW District 8, which includes West Virginia, Kentucky, Virginia and Maryland.
After paying monthly premiums, the workers may obtain much of their medical care free if they got to ARH facilities.
ARH offered to increase the amount it paid into the employees’ pension plan but it also wanted to exclude all new employees from that plan and give them instead what is essentially a tax-free retirement savings account. The USW believes all workers are entitled to a traditional, defined benefit pension plan that will provide income no matter how long they live.
The ARH workers sacrificed increases to their own pensions in exchange for ARH removing its proposed retirement savings plan from the bargaining table and assuring that new young workers would have traditional pensions and secure retirements.
The ARH system was founded a half a century ago by the United Mine Workers to care for miners and their families.
The USW represents 36,000 members in health care and 850,000 overall in the U.S. and Canada.
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HEALTH CARE WORKERS COUNCIL
