The union representing more than 1,000 nurses at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital in New Brunswick issued a strike notice Monday. Nurses could be on the picket line no sooner than ten days if contract negotiations aren’t settled. The union rejected the most recent contract offer from the hospital and continued to push for more staffing and better pay.
“… the staffing is not up to par that the nurses want it to be,” said United Steelworkers Local 4-200 union president Judy Danella. “They want ratios in the contract, they want specific guidelines. They did put guidelines in our tentative agreement, but the guidelines did not take into account if a nurse is out sick.” Similar issues are being echoed by hospital workers across the state. Nurses from Clara Maass Medical Center, also owned by RWJ Barnabas Health, rallied at the weekend to voice their own concerns and demands for a better working environment.
“We don’t have some of the resources that you might see at other hospitals, which makes our jobs so much harder,” said Clara Maass registered nurse Elizabeth Rosa. “But it also makes each and everyone of these people behind me some of the best damn nurses you’ll ever have in your life.”
— Editor’s note: RWJBarnabas Health is an underwriter of NJ Spotlight News.
