Baystate Franklin Medical Center in Greenfield. RECORDER FILE PHOTO/PAUL FRANZ
For the Gazette
GREENFIELD — After off-the-record contract talks between Baystate Franklin Medical Center administration and nurses, the two parties walked away with different takes on negotiations that still are not nearing a conclusion.
While the nurses union said the talks have “broken down,” the hospital presented that Wednesday’s session resulted in a number of “positive proposals” and “resolved a number of outstanding issues.”
The nurses said they will now hold an “urgent” meeting of its union members to go over its next steps.
Between two negotiation sessions in the past week, which approached a total of 24 hours, the two groups were looking to build on some mild momentum that had been gained in the prior couple of months regarding an ongoing labor dispute — now in its 15th month.
Both parties released statements through a respective spokesperson to tell how the negotiations went. Earlier in the dispute, the union head and the hospital president spoke on progress over issues like staffing, health care and overtime pay.
“Our nurses will hold urgent membership meetings in the coming days to determine their next course of action,” Massachusetts Nurses Association spokesman Joe Markman said in his statement. “We were able to secure a few tentative agreements, but management will not agree to core nurse proposals.”
Hospital spokeswoman Molly Macmunn said its proposals to the nurses “reflect our good faith effort to create a fair contract and we hope to reach a resolution soon.”
Wednesday’s meeting piggybacked on a continued meeting from this past Thursday, Jan. 11. That prior meeting went about 14 hours and led to “conceptual progress,” according to Markman at the time; the hospital did not respond to requests for comment after that meeting.
Often, the hospital administration has said it will not negotiate its contract with the nurses, which was set to expire Jan. 2017. The nurses have regularly expressed interest in publicly detailing some of its issues at the bargaining table.
“In addition to our already strong commitment to maintain a market competitive benefit package, we were also able to agree to increases in our educational benefits and shift differential payments,” Macmunn said in her statement.
The nurses pointed to issues that are still at odds.
“Management will not agree to provide a standard adequate health insurance plan or commit to improve nurse staffing for safe patient care,” Markman said in his statement.
The nurses illustrated one issue regarding staffing, about supervising nurses taking a patient assignment. Markman’s statement explains their stance, saying the solution is two-prong. In addition to not assigning patients to supervising nurses, the hospital should not assign more patients to other nurses in keeping with a bid for “safe staffing ratios.”
If these two elements are not both addressed, Markman said, then “the problems Baystate Franklin nurses have identified for years will remain.” He added that the hospital has “refused” to agree to this type of solution.
The hospital provided its own take on staffing.
“Among the recommended proposals was an updated approach to staffing that we believe provides flexibility and assures that we meet our shared goal of delivering high quality patient care in a community setting,” Macmunn said.
Neither party was able to confirm members of either side that were at the meeting.
Asked whether the now-resigned president Cindy Russo was present or if the interim-president Ron Bryant was at the negotiation table, neither the nurses nor the hospital would comment.
