Registered Nurses (RNs) rallied last Friday for a better pay increase than they have been offered by Montefiore Medical Center. The nurses, represented by their union, the New York State Nurses Association (NYSNA), have been without a contract since January 2005.

Standing in front of Montefiore’s Moses Division on Gun Hill Road, about 70 nurses turned out to hear union representatives demand a pay increase more in line with inflation, estimated at 4.5 percent by the union. In April, nurses rejected, by eight to one, the Medical Center’s latest offer of a three-percent pay increase on base salary, which is $60,528, according to NYSNA. There are about 2,300 RNs at Montefiore.

Tomas Darby, a NYSNA labor representative, was particularly concerned that the hospital’s offer only applied to base salary. In this way, he said, more experienced, higher paid nurses, are being shortchanged, because their percentage raise would be less than newcomers to the profession.

Judy Sheridan-Gonzalez, a Montefiore nurse and president of NYSNA’s Montefiore/Moses division, charged that the hospital is trying to break the back of the union. “We concerned they want to silence us,” she said. Sheridan-Gonzalez pointed out that instead of trying to negotiate, the Medical Center, in preparation for a strike, is hiring non-union nurses and housing them in a Westchester hotel. Some are already working, and earning, Sheridan-Gonzalez said, close to $1,000 a shift. “Clearly [Montefiore has] the money to reach our modest offer,” she said.

Lola Fehr, executive director of NYSNA, is worried that Montefiore’s position could affect staff morale. “If you lose morale,” she said, “you lose energy… and all the things that make a successful hospital.”

The nurses, who sometimes struggled to hear the speakers since organizers were denied a permit for a sound system, said the dispute goes deeper than money. “It’s more than the salary,” said Andrea Williams, a Montefiore nurse for the last six years. “I think it’s about respect. We are the backbone of this place and we don’t have the staff and we don’t have a contract that covers the cost of living. We’re professionals, not children.”

“A lot of people don’t realize how hard we work,” said nurse Juany Ramirez, who has worked at the hospital for the last 15 years. “It’s gotten worse and worse,” she continued, adding that nurses are responsible for more patients than ever. Ramirez is hopeful that an agreement can be reached, but she’s prepared to take the dispute further. “I think I would do it,” she said sadly, when asked if she’s prepared to strike. “We don’t want to because of the patients, but when push comes to shove we might have to do it.”

Officials of the city’s Transit Workers Union, which went on strike at the end of last year, spoke at the rally to show solidarity with the nurses.

Montefiore would not respond to the specifics of the nurses’ charges but issued the following statement:

“We respect and value our professional nursing staff and the exceptional contributions they make to patient care every day. Because of that, we have offered them [the nurses] a very competitive labor package that we even enhanced with recommendations made by a federal mediator in order to bring this contract to closure. We look forward to our next bargaining session on May 17.”

Ed. note: The Norwood News is published by Mosholu Preservation Corporation, a not-for-profit affiliate of Montefiore Medical Center.