Unionized Maui Memorial health care workers to hold 3-day strike
Hundreds of unionized health care workers, including most of the essential staff at Maui Memorial Medical Center, will hold a three-day strike starting Nov. 4 in protest of unfair labor practices.
The union representing them — United Nurses and Health Care Employees of Hawaii — announced today that the strike will begin at 7 a.m. on Nov. 4 and end at 7 a.m. on Nov. 7.
UNHCEH represents about 1,000 registered nurses, pharmacists, imaging techs and other workers, who voted to authorize a strike last month, prior to their contract expiring on Sept. 30.
Talks with Maui Health, which operates Maui Memorial, the not-for-profit organization affiliated with Kaiser Permanente, have been ongoing since late July, with an in-person session today yielding no settlement.
The union says it is advocating for living wages, safer nurse-to-patient ratios, and equal benefits.
“The community’s been hurting ever since COVID,” said Matt Pelc, a CT Tech and UNHCEH Chair, in a news release. “This year alone, because of those [Aug. 8, 2023] fires, rent has gone up on Maui about 40%. We’re losing staff left and right. Many people have moved off the island because they couldn’t afford to live here. We’re trying to make it so nurses and healthcare workers can afford to stay and care for our ohana.”
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The union says that Kaiser, which is “the gold standard for healthcare nationwide,” took over management of Maui Health in 2017, along with promises to elevate care standards, but “has not kept its promises to Maui and Lanai residents.”
The health care workers at Maui Memorial are covered by separate contracts from other KP health care workers in Hawaii and in the U.S., the union said, and are not only getting lower wages and benefits, but working under lower care standards, with high turnover and chronic staffing shortages.
The union wants the same nurse-to-patient ratios on Maui that Kaiser has agreed to in its contract covering registered nurses in California.
Unionized health care workers at Kula Hospital and Lanai Community Hospital run by Maui Health will also participate in the three-day strike.
