NYSNA Update: May 1, 2026
North Country Nurses Advocate for Fair Funding for Rural Healthcare
On Tuesday, Apr. 28, NYSNA members from across the North Country traveled to Albany to hold a briefing for legislators where they spoke on the critical need for funding to improve rural healthcare. Decades of disinvestment, service closures and hospital consolidation have eroded access to care in the North Country, New York’s largest and most rural region, and the federal cuts to healthcare funding only stand to exacerbate the ongoing crisis.
Already, rural communities are beginning to see the impacts of the Trump administration’s “One Big Beautiful Bill.” Earlier this year, North Star/Carthage Area Hospital and Claxton-Hepburn Medical Center filed for bankruptcy and announced potential service cuts and closures. NYSNA nurses spoke out, demanding that the state take action to ensure access to care for their patients and communities, and they successfully advocated for the funds necessary to keep their hospitals open. This week, they brought the fight to Albany to demand that legislators fairly fund rural safety-net hospitals and ensure access to care for all North Country residents! Keep up the great work, North Country nurses!
On Wednesday, Politico covered the nurses’ fight against a proposal in the New York state budget that would leave patientsHome All Alone. Read our open letter to Governor Kathy Hochul to learn more about why nurses oppose this proposal.
Next week, NYSNA nurses are back in Albany to advocate for fair hospital funding, against the Hospital at Home program and more. With the state budget more than one month late, there is still time to advocate for what nurses and patients deserve. Stay tuned!
UVM-CVPH Healthcare Workers Speak Out for Safe Staffing and a Fair Contract
On Wednesday, Apr. 29, NYSNA healthcare workers at University of Vermont-Champlain Valley Physicians Hospital (CVPH) held a speak-out to demand safe staffing and a fair contract. NYSNA healthcare workers were joined at the speak-out by Kim Hartshorn, Secretary of the Northeast Central CLC, and received coverage in NBC5, ABC22, the Sun Community News, and WAMC.
Last year, CVPH changed staffing ratios in four medical-surgical units over nurses’ objections, violating NYSNA members’ contract and making the hospital less safe. Now, in the midst of NYSNA members’ fight for a new contract, CVPH management is once again putting patient care at risk and trying to avoid accountability by refusing to include enforceable safe staffing language in healthcare workers’ contract. NYSNA members, though, are committed to caring for their community and will continue to fight for a fair contract that ensures safe, quality care for CVPH patients!
NYP-Brooklyn Methodist Nurses Take Action
Shout out to NYP-Brooklyn Methodist nurses who are taking action for a fair contract! Last Friday, nurses showed their solidarity by wearing buttons at work that said “Fair Contact Now” and “Safe Nurses = Safe Patients.” On the same day, dozens of members gathered at bargaining to deliver a petition to management signed by over 1,100 RNs. Vilma, a Contract Action Team member, rolled up to management on roller skates to hand management the petitions! Check out photos from the action on Facebook.
The nurses also started community outreach to build support for improving nurse and patient safety at the hospital. So far, approximately 50 businesses in Park Slope have put up signs in solidarity with nurses!