Units 17 & 20 Joint Bargaining Update for Monday, August 5th, 2019
Units 17 and 20 Bargain Jointly with the State Over Mandatory Overtime & Vacation Schedules

Our bargaining teams representing Unit 17 (Registered Nurses) and Unit 20 (Medical and Social Service Specialists) met jointly with the state on Monday, August 5, 2019, to negotiate over issues impacting members in both units.

“It’s past time for mandatory overtime to be eliminated,“ said Luisa Leuma, chair of bargaining unit 20. “We’re working to improve the work/life balance of our members and to get rid of mandated overtime shifts.”

Our joint team presented a proposal today that would phase out the dangerous practice of mandatory overtime for our Unit 17 & 20 workers. Often used as a daily staffing tool by management, mandatory overtime affects the health and safety of our members, the quality of patient care they deliver, and the safety of the communities where they live. And while mandatory overtime (MOT) has already been eliminated through a California law for private sector nurses, we’re also renewing our push to end mandatory overtime for public sector nurses. 

In 2016, our bargaining team won reductions in the maximum number of overtime shifts that could be mandated each month — from 5 to 4 for Unit 17 and from 6 down to 5 for Unit 20. Today’s proposal would remove all mandatory overtime shifts except in defined emergencies upon ratification of our new contract.

“This is one of our most pressing issues,” said Kim Cowart, Unit 17 chair. “We need to keep pushing the state to end mandatory overtime.”

2016 also saw Units 17 & 20 win a contract provision to create a task force to examine and improve vacation scheduling for a number of Unit 17 & 20 classifications working for California Correctional Health Care Services (CCHCS) at 24-hour facilities. 

The outcome of that task force was presented as proposals to enforce the leave rights of all Unit 17 & 20 members by offering a standardized approach to vacation scheduling, which would be uniformly applied across all facilities.

Meanwhile, members across the state continue to take action in support of our efforts to “Stop MOT” in the workplace and in their communities, and to show up and show out at the Capitol Rally on August 13th.