New York Nurses Gain Support in Fight to Save Hospitals

CWA nurses in New York are building legislative support to stop the state from closing nine hospitals statewide, including three in Buffalo that employ nearly 4,000 members of Local 1168, Nurses United.

In the last week, four legislators announced plans to introduce bills to save St. Joseph Hospital in Buffalo. Local 1168 President John Klein said several other lawmakers are working to save DeGraff Hospital. Nearly 800 members work at the two hospitals. So far, no bills are pending to save Gates Hospital, where 1,500 members work, but Klein said the local is actively reaching out to lawmakers and the public for help.

A state commission made up of businesspeople, insurance companies, bankers and doctors – but no union representatives – recommended the closures last year. The panel's report was adopted by default at the end of 2006 when the legislature failed to act to stop it.

CWA and other health care unions fought hard before the report became law, and have fought even harder since. "We're not saying it lightly, but we believe people will die if the Berger Commission proposals are put in place – one of the closures will add a 25-minute ride to the nearest emergency room," Klein said.

CWA's news conferences, town hall meetings and other outreach are having an effect, he said. "The legislature is starting to pick up on the commission's flaws," he said. "One state senator, George Maziarz, has said that the fact that CWA's been out there bringing it to their attention is the key to why they're looking at it now."

Meanwhile, CWA nurses are waging other battles to ensure quality patient care. About 100 nurses from Local 1168 and Local 1126 in Utica joined hundreds of others in Albany last week for a rally at the state capitol to support pending bills that would cap mandatory overtime hours for nurses and increase the ratio of nurses to patients in hospitals.

"The statistics prove those better staffing saves patients' lives," said Diana Butsch, a Buffalo, N.Y., nurse and Local 1168 chief steward. She and other nurses said the ratio in critical care units should be no more than 1 nurse for 2 patients, and ideally one-to-one because each critically ill person needs constant monitoring. On regular patient floors, a nurse should have no more than four or five patients, but most have 10 to 15, or even more, and they "are incredibly sick people," she said.