Nearly 200 employees from the Technical bargaining unit at St. Charles Medical Center in Bend ratified their next union contract that will establish conditions for workers and ensure continuity of care in Bend. According to information from Oregon Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals, 100% of those workers who voted chose to ratify this contract, signifying a universal level of support for the agreement. These healthcare workers, who are members of the Oregon Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals (OFNHP, AFT Local 5017), were fighting over issues like living wages and a voice on the job.
“The ratification of our new contract is a positive step forward, one that will serve our community through better recruitment and retention of highly skilled health providers,” says Tyler Ecklund, a Nuclear Medicine Technologist who served on the union’s bargaining team.
Besides raises and cost of living adjustments (COLAs), this new collective bargaining agreement (CBA) establishes a predictable pay scale that determines wage raises according to years of tenure and experience. Other new components of the contract include improved language governing time-off, reform to disciplinary procedures, strengthened union rights, and language to protect workers if St. Charles is ever sold to a new hospital system. All of these measures should help to reduce turnover, attract and retain qualified staff, and act as a stabilizing force for the future of Central Oregon’s healthcare system.
This union contract will be in effect for the next three years, which is when the union and the employer will resume negotiations on the subsequent agreement. This is the second union contract that has been ratified since the historic nine-day strike in 2021, which engaged our entire community and our state’s political leaders in a fight to improve conditions in the hospital.
OFNHP represents over 6,000 healthcare workers across Oregon and Southwest Washington. In 2025, the union will start a large-scale bargaining campaign with Kaiser Permanente along with over 50,000 healthcare professionals from across the country as a part of the larger Alliance of Healthcare Unions.
