Friday, June 1, 2018
Friday was meant to be the final day of negotiations, but six hours after the morning event, union leaders told hundreds of nurses and community members packed inside the Davis Auditorium that no deal had been made. The current contract is scheduled to expire on July 9.
Leaders called for members of the Vermont Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals, which represents about 1,800 nurses at UVM Medical Center, to attend an all-member meeting on June 6 to voice their opinions on the union's bottom line and the methods they should use to obtain their goals.
Earlier in the day, Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, rallied with the nurses outside of the hospital. The national labor leader called for the hospital to care for its community and spend money on nurses rather than on administrative salaries.
“You're acting like the Trump administration, not like a Vermont administration,” Weingarten said.
Tags: Senator , union , University of Vermont Medical Center , labor relations , nurses , Bernie Sanders , Eileen Whalen , Randi Weingarten , Julie MacMillan , Anna Westervelt , Image , Web Only
Tuesday, May 8, 2018
The 77-69 vote came after a daylong debate that hinged on whether the minimum wage increase would help or hurt Vermont's lowest-paid workers.
“We must have the courage to tilt the playing field, the smallest amount, as slowly as possible” in favor of low-income workers, said Rep. Tom Stevens (D-Waterbury).
Tags: minimum wage , labor , poverty , Robin Chesnut-Tangerman , Cynthia Browning , Heidi Scheuermann , Tom Stevens , Valerie Stuart , Image , Web Only
Wednesday, April 4, 2018
The Vermont State Employees' Association denounced a decision by Gov. Phil Scott’s administration that will make it more difficult for its members to access certain prescription drugs.
The governor's administration sent the union a list of nearly 170 medications that, beginning next January, will be excluded from state workers’ health insurance plans. That means current and retired employees will either have to switch to a cheaper alternative, if one exists, or file an appeal to continue receiving their medication.
The list includes a number of common drugs such as Adderall, blood glucose meters and test strips, EstroGel, Prozac, Valium and Xanax.
“They’re putting their desire to save money over the medical needs of retirees and state employees and their families,” said VSEA executive director Steve Howard.
Tags: Vermont State Employees Union , VSEA , Phil Scott , Steve Howard , prescription drug benefit , Image , Web Only
Monday, February 5, 2018
Ismina Francois, a mental health specialist, made repeated complaints about the widespread use of racial slurs and racial insensitivities at the facility in Berlin but a culture of intolerance persisted, a commission investigator found.
For example — despite Francois' prior complaints — a hospital staffer assigned her to care for a racist patient with a swastika tattoo who had previously lunged at Francois and yelled "get that nigger away from me."
Traveling nurses who worked temporary stints at the hospital reported being surprised at how often patients used racial slurs. And other employees used terms like "nappy hair," "hood car," "fried chicken," "colored people" and speculated about Francois being on "welfare," according to the report.
"A reasonable person could conclude that the offensive jokes, slurs, epithets, name calling, insults and put-downs by patients and coworkers were pervasive," Human Rights Commission investigator Bor Yang wrote in the 35-page report finalized in January.
Tags: Vermont Department of Mental Health , mental health , racism , Vermont Psychiatric Care Hospital , Ismina Francois , Tim McCants , Image , Web Only
Tuesday, October 3, 2017
Members of Migrant Justice and Ben & Jerry's CEO Jostein Solheim announced the deal Tuesday during a celebratory gathering in front of the ice cream shop on Church Street in Burlington. Solheim touted the program as "first in the dairy industry, first in the world."
Then he and members of Migrant Justice signed the Milk With Dignity contract that will eventually be applied to all northeastern farms in Ben & Jerry's supply chain.
Tags: Migrant Justice , Will Lambek , Ben & Jerry's , Enrique Balcazar , Thelma Gomez , Milk With Dignity , Jostein Solheim , Image , Web Only
Tuesday, September 19, 2017
The Burlington Education Association and the Burlington School Board reached a tentative agreement Tuesday shortly before 8 p.m., ending a labor dispute that kept 3,600 students out of school for four days.
Many parents sighed with relief that the bitter dispute was over. The details of the agreement will not be public until the board and union ratify the terms. The union is set to vote on it Wednesday at 4 p.m. in the Burlington High School auditorium. The school board had not set a vote time Tuesday evening.
The last teachers' strike in Burlington was in 1978, according to the Vermont-National Education Association.
Joanna Grossman of Burlington's South End cheered the news that an eight-hour mediation session Tuesday resulted in a deal. Her daughter was set to return to her second-grade class at Champlain Elementary School.
Tags: Fran Brock , Burlington teachers , Burlington School Board , Vermont-National Education Association , Burlington Education Association , Image , Web Only
Thursday, September 7, 2017
Teachers voted to strike Thursday afternoon. The move escalated the tension in a messy labor dispute and created uncertainty for parents of the city's 3,700 public school students.
“Moments ago, my fellow members and I voted to authorize a strike beginning on September 13 if the board fails to come back to the table and stay there until we reach an agreement for a contract covering this school year,” said Fran Brock, Burlington Education Association president, in a press release issued late Thursday afternoon.
Brock, a Burlington High School history teacher, lashed out at the board for imposing contract terms last Friday and also accused the board of neglecting student needs.
Tags: Burlington teachers , Fran Brock , Mark Porter , teachers strike , Image , Web Only
Tuesday, May 16, 2017
At issue is Scott's demand that negotiations for teacher health care benefits be done on a statewide basis — the best way, he says, to maximize taxpayer savings from pending changes in health insurance due to the federal Affordable Care Act. Democrats have pushed back on Scott's idea as an encroachment on the collective bargaining process between teachers and local school boards. House and Senate leaders have sought common ground with the governor, so far without success.
Johnson's plan has not been made public, but its outline has been widely circulated. It would leave negotiations at the local level while establishing statewide parameters for health care bargaining.
Tags: Mitzi Johnson , Phil Scott , Martha Allen , Rebecca Ramos , teacher health care , Vermont budget , Image , Web Only
Thursday, March 23, 2017
The breach happened at a private firm called America’s Job Link Alliance, which contracts with Vermont and nine other states to provide a database for job seekers and employers. Under state law, anyone who applies for unemployment benefits — unless they have a firm return-to-work date within 10 weeks — is required to register with JobLink and regularly use the site to search for work.
Scott said the personal data — name, address, birthdate and Social Security number — of all applicants may have been compromised, going all the way back to the year 2003, when the state began contracting with AJLA. That’s a total of 180,000 applicants in Vermont.
Tags: Phil Scott , Lindsay Kurrle , America's Job Link Alliance , Image , Web Only
Friday, March 17, 2017
By a 7-4 vote, the House General, Housing and Military Affairs Committee advanced the legislation. It’s unclear, however, whether the bill — strongly opposed by business organizations — will make it through the full legislature this year.
The legislation calls for a 0.93 percent mandatory tax on all employees in Vermont. That money would go into a pool to pay for up to 12 weeks time off for the birth of a child, a serious personal illness or caring for a seriously ill family member starting in 2019.
Tags: paid family leave , Helen Head , Heidi Scheuermann , Main Street Alliance , Vermont Legislature , Image , Web Only