UNM Hospital health care workers have reached an agreement with hospital administrators granting employees a 2.7 percent annual wage increase.
Nearly 45 health care employees picketed outside the hospital on Aug. 10 for improved wages and benefits. The employees partnered with the National Union of Hospital and Health Care Employees for the demonstration.
Negotiations still continue.
UNM Hospital License and Technical president Gilberta Miera said past negotiations with hospital administrators have not gone well.
“The last two years we have gone above and beyond, and they have expected us to come forward, but now they won’t come forward,” she said.
A representative from the UNM Hospital negotiations team declined to comment.
With health care premiums rising, Miera said workers will be losing money if they don’t get a raise, despite a 3.5 percent wage increase last year.
Critical Care Nurse Dahlia Lopez said the relationship between administrators and employees has been strained because staff members are not appreciated.
“UNM is the only trauma hospital in the state and we have the lowest wages. The people who work here — we work here because we care,” she said. “We do what it takes to take care of the patients who are here.”
Lopez said although she sympathizes with the hospital’s need to save money during hard economic times, she wants management to consider employee needs.
“I understand management wanting to hold onto money for a rainy day, but we have employees here that cannot afford health insurance because they do not make enough money to pay for insurance,” she said.
Miera said the picket was not designed to get a response from hospital administrators but to inform the community about problems UNM Hospital employees are facing.
“We are not doing this to captivate them,” she said. “We are doing this because it is our right and we are tired of being walked all over. We don’t want a negative relationship, but we are going to continue to agitate the employees union because we want to continue to show them our position.”
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Chris Chavez, executive director of the NM Federation of Labor AFL-CIO, said UNM Hospital needs to understand that its employees are the backbone of the health care industry.
“Corporate employees wouldn’t have a job if it wasn’t for those that work for them,” he said. “The worker is more important than the buck.”
An agreement was drafted on Aug. 11 before health care workers voted and approved it Aug. 13 and 14. Miera said management was eager to reach an agreement after the picket, and was more receptive to employee needs.
“We received a 2.7 percent annual increase, and although management was trying to take retirement out of our contracts, they agreed to leave it in.” she said.
Lopez said UNM Hospital employees have earned a pay increase, which shows appreciation for all the work health care employees do.
“I am hoping that they will acknowledge the employees,” she said. “We want to be known as the hard workers that we are.”
