Nurses rallied on Labor Day outside Albany Medical Center and announced they’ve authorized a potential strike over their ongoing contract dispute with the hospital. Albany Med nurses have been in negotiations for a first contract for more than two years. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, Albany Med has publicly celebrated nurses as heroes, while privately cutting nurses’ hours, staffing, salaries, and input into safety measures at the hospital.

Union and community organizations from the Capital Region joined the rally to celebrate solidarity and support Albany Med nurses, including the Capital District Area Labor Federation, the Building and Construction Trades Council and the Albany area chapter of the NAACP.

"We have been working tirelessly especially through COVID," Lisa Case is a Registered Nurse who works in the hospital’s operating room. "AMC is trying to make us out as the heroes but they know that we're still understaffed...they took away our merit increases for a year and we're still having things held from us. We love working here and this is why we're fighting so hard to get this contract."

A supermajority nurses authorized a strike. They head back to the bargaining table in the hopes of negotiating a fair contract and averting a strike.

Albany Med nurses were joined by nurses at Bellevue Women’s Center and Ellis Hospital, whose recently-settled contracts set a new standard in the region. Cathy Dawson, RN, a nurse leader at Ellis Hospital said, “At Ellis, we just won an amazing contract because we were persistent — we didn’t back down or give up. We know the Albany Med nurses can do the same, and we Ellis nurses are here in solidarity for as long as it takes.”