Cloe Poisson / CTMirror.org
Gov. Ned Lamont put the state’s largest health care workers’ union on notice Tuesday evening that he’d made his last and best financial offer to avert a strike threatened for Friday.
The governor’s chief of staff, Paul Mounds Jr., also used a virtual news conference to challenge SEIU District 1199 New England and more than three dozen congregate care facilities to remain at the bargaining table and hammer out a deal.
The $280 million, two-year package the administration disclosed publicly Monday “was the best and final offer proposal which would be presented,” Mounds said, adding, “this is a very fair, aggressive and honest offer that has been put forth by the governor.”
Strike deadline nears for 3,400 Connecticut nursing home workers
Workers at 33 nursing homes in Connecticut could begin a strike on Friday, May 14, if their demands for better pay, benefits and staffing ratios are not met. More than 3,400 nurses, receptionists, dietary aides, housekeepers and laundry staff at these facilities have been working without a contract since March 15. Contracts at 18 other Connecticut nursing homes have expired as well, and workers at these sites could join the strike, should it occur.
Healthcare workers protest over payroll delays in February outside of Allied Community Services East Windsor, CT. (Photo credit: Shana Sureck with the New England Health Care Employees Union, District 1199, SEIU)
By Keith M. Phaneuf, CT Mirror
The state and its largest healthcare workers union continued their game of brinksmanship Monday as Connecticut inched closer to a major strike involving nursing and group homes.
While SEIU District 1199 New England added six more nursing homes to the potential strike, lifting the tally to 39, Gov. Ned Lamont disclosed he offered “an aggressive proposal” involving $280 million in new federal and state money to bolster the industry and avert a work stoppage.
Also Monday, the union and Yale University unveiled a new study that concluded state health officials were lax in their regulation of nursing homes during the first year of the coronavirus pandemic.
McCaw sent the letters to the Service Employees International Union’s District 1199 New England, which represents about 5,000 nursing home workers in Connecticut, and the presidents of the Connecticut Association of Health Care Facilities and LeadingAge Connecticut, which represent nursing homes and other health care facilities around the state.
There was no immediate response from the union or the two industry groups.
The Lamont administration’s proposed funding package also includes a temporary 10% Medicaid rate increase from July 1, 2021 to March 31, 2022, totaling $85.8 million. In addition, the state would increase funding by $19.5 million for pension enhancements for workers, $13 million for worker training and $12.5 million for hazard pay for workers.