Union seeks L-M and legislative solutions PEF working with GOER to tackle nursing issues By SHERRY HALBROOK Understaffing, mandatory overtime and many other professional and work issues important to PEF nurses are at the heart of high-level labor-management discussions going on between PEF and the state. PEF nurses Debbie Egel, June Edwards and Joyce Degenhardt represent the union on the Joint Labor-Management Committee on Nursing Issues authorized by a side letter to the PS&T contract. “We have been talking with the Governor’s Office of Employee Relations about recruitment and retention problems in state nursing,” said Egel who, with Edwards, co-chairs the PEF Nurses Committee. “When we meet again on February 8th, we want to discuss nursing ‘best practices’ that could help to relieve the nursing shortage in state service.” “We want PEF nurses to send us their ideas and suggestions,” Egel said. “They can send them to us (at PEF Nurses Committee, c/o Margaret Wexler, PO Box 12414, Albany, NY 12212-2414) or e-mail them to PEFonline@pef.org.” One good example of a best practice, said PEF Nursing Committee member Dee Dodson, is the nursing internship program at the state University of New York (SUNY) Stony Brook University Hospital on Long Island. “Nurses can complete a rotation through the hospital’s surgical or medical services and then decide where they would like to work,” said Dodson, a nurse on the hospital’s neo-natal intensive-care unit. While the union is tackling these issues at the labor-management level, it is also looking to the state Legislature and Congress for help in solving these problems that beleaguer healthcare nationwide. Nurses to lobby on issues The PEF Nurses Committee will lead the union’s nurses in lobbying legislators in their districts. They will ask the lawmakers to support legislation to curb mandatory overtime, protect quality patient care, preserve professional nursing standards and protect nurses who blow the whistle on poor patient care. “The Whistleblower bill was passed by the state Legislature last year, but the governor vetoed it,” Dodson said. “But we will keep working on it until we get it signed into law.” The nurses said they are very encouraged by the attention national legislation to rein-in mandatory OT is getting in the US Senate. “It would apply to most PEF nurses, because it would be tied to Medicaid funding,” Egel said. “But it still doesn’t have sponsors in the House of Representatives.” More and more PEF nurses are learning how to lobby and work for positive changes at their worksites, the nurses said. Nurses training planned “We had a good training session in western New York last year, as well as training with our 2001 Lobby Day,” Degenhardt said. “Now, the PEF Nurses Committee is planning a Nurses Education Day for New York City,” Dodson said. “PEF nurses should watch The Communicator, the PEF Information Line and Website for more information about this,” Egel said. Staff position still vacant “Meanwhile,” Egel added, “PEF is still actively looking for someone to fill the position of assistant director of labor relations for nursing policy, a position that was created last year after Lenore Boris left the union’s staff as its nurse organizer. “Any one who is interested in the new position should check out the job description available at www.pef.org or call PEF at 1-800-342-4306, ext. 212.” Back to Communicator Homepage