2-Year Agreement Preserves Health Coverage for Care Providers and Protects Services for Elderly and Disabled Oregonians
A member bargaining committee representing nearly 10,000
SEIU Local 503 homecare workers has reached a tentative agreement with
the state on a new contract that protects historic gains in paid health
coverage made in prior years and preserves pay rates and working
conditions that have made Oregon a national leader in community homecare.
“I’m so excited that in a most difficult bargaining year we were able
to negotiate an increase in the state’s contribution to cover rising health care costs,” said Beverly Mackey, a Lincoln City homecare worker who chaired the SEIU 503 elected bargaining committee.
“We have protected services for our clients and won a fair contract for our members.”
Agreement late Monday on the new two-year contract, effective July 1,
2009, capped an often tense eight months of bargaining and lobbying
that started with a successful effort to reverse legislative budget proposals that threatened severe cuts to client care.
Members and allies converged on the Capitol in Salem to urge
legislators to preserve Oregon’s 30-year role as a national pioneer in
applying Medicaid funds to pay for home-based health care for seniors
and people with disabilities.
Their argument became all the more convincing after federal stimulus
dollars increased the federal government’s share of Medicaid costs.
That fight won, SEIU 503 members turned their attention to bargaining
that began Feb. 2 and focused largely on health coverage. For months,
state negotiators refused to commit to covering premium increases for
represented homecare workers who receive fully paid medical, dental and
vision coverage if they work 80 hours a month.
Oregon homecare workers, the first in the nation to be granted the
right to form a union by the state’s voters in a ballot referendum that
established the Oregon Homecare Commission in 1999, negotiated their
first contract in 2001. Hourly care providers earn $10.20 an hour;
24-hour live-in care providers, $4.55 an hour. These levels represent a
win-win for the state, which avoids having to pay for more expensive nursing care, and for clients, who are able to remain in their homes.
The new contract contained several other improvements important to many
members, including one provision allowing round-the-clock workers to
take paid leave in 12-hour blocks instead of a full day at a time.
Members will vote on the contract in the coming weeks at regional meetings or by mail.
Committee Vice-Chair Virginia Griensewic, a homecare worker from
Tangent in central Oregon said the committee unanimously recommended a
yes vote.
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