Nurses and health care professionals at Porter Medical Center have their first employment contract with the Middlebury hospital, after voting last year to form a union.
The Porter Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals reached a tentative agreement with hospital management last week, and it was ratified by a majority of union employees Monday.
The contract took effect Tuesday and runs through September 2017.
The deal puts “serious limits” on the use of mandatory overtime, according to a statement from the Vermont Chapter of the American Federation of Teachers, which represents the Porter nurses union.
The nurses’ contract also moves them to a wage scale that will, over time, “correct the vast inequities” in wages at Porter Medical Center, according to the statement. The hospital will also pay for nurses’ continuing education requirements.
Other elements include committees to make recommendations on safe staffing levels, and a guarantee that nurses will be consulted and trained on new equipment before it’s put into use.
“Two years of planning, dreaming and hard work ended up to be a great accomplishment that led to the reality of a first nursing contract for the hospital where I am proud to work,” Janet Mosurick, R.N., said in the statement.
“The delivery of health care is better for a community when workers and management can bargain over issues affecting patients, and that’s what happened here,” AFT President Randi Weingarten said.
Forced overtime and “chaotic schedules” put patients at risk, and the new contract minimizes that risk, according to Weingarten.
“Porter Medical Center is pleased to have reached an agreement with our nurses that we feel is fair to all parties and all of our employees equally, that is financially responsible to our organization and, most important, reflects decisions that keep our patients and residents at the center of our work,” Porter spokesman Ron Hallman said in an emailed statement.
