CVPH to veteran employees: “Pay for your own retirement now”

Images: Informational Picketing, 13 June 2007

Staff protests pension cuts

Related link: wcax.com - CVPH Nurses Rally for Support
Related link: Plattsburgh Press-Republican - CVPH professionals voice displeasure over contract proposal

PLATTSBURGH, June 8, 2007 – Apparently a warm handshake is the only reward that management of Champlain Valley Physicians Hospital Medical Center (CVPH) wants to give its healthcare professionals for their many years of service to the community.

In its latest contract offer on May 31, CVPH management continued to demand givebacks in the professionals’ pension plan. In response, the professionals, represented by the New York State Nurses Association (NYSNA) conducted an informational picket from 2 to 5 p.m. on Wednesday, June 13, in front of the medical center at 75 Beekman Street.

NYSNA represents 600 healthcare professionals at the facility, including registered nurses, physician assistants, pharmacists, social workers, technicians, and therapists. Their most recent contract expired on Jan. 1, 2007.

Management’s latest offer would freeze the current pension and replace it with a plan to which employees would have to contribute. NYSNA believes this is unfair because many CVPH professionals believed that the longer they remained employed at the medical center, the greater pension they would receive. This proposed change would also have a devastating economic effect on employees and their families.

In addition, management’s wage proposal would put the medical center at a disadvantage in recruiting and retaining qualified healthcare staff. NYSNA has determined that management’s latest offer would result in CVPH base salaries below those at Alice Hyde Hospital and Fletcher Allen Medical Center.

No further negotiation sessions are scheduled.

With more than 34,000 members, NYSNA is the oldest and largest state nurses’ association in the nation. It is an influential union for RNs, representing nurses in New York and New Jersey. Offering a wide range of services to its members, NYSNA fosters high standards of nursing education and practice and works to advance the profession through legislative activity. It is a constituent of the American Nurses Association and of the United American Nurses, an affiliate of the AFL-CIO.

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