Update regarding Kaleida Health's decision to change the way short staffing is reported

On Friday, April 12th, Kaleida Chief Nursing Officers met with Union leadership to discuss the CSC Complaint process. At this meeting, Kaleida introduced a new complaint system that they had built without the knowledge of either Unions. The topic was shocking to the Union leaders who have worked hard over the past few years to implement the Staffing Law. The meeting was followed up by a Friday night email from the CNOs at 9:42 pm indicating that they intended to move forward with their plan and wanted to have a vote at the CSC meetings on Monday April 15th to adopt their new complaint system.

On Monday, we had very contentious CSC meetings with Kaleida Management. CWA 1168 President Cori Gambini advised management that for the past year they had not been taking the complaint process seriously. Kaleida only became concerned after the DOH visited both Millard and BGMC. No vote took place at these meetings and we are planning additional discussions with Kaleida on this issue.

CWA 1168 and 1199SEIU have no interest in moving to a complaint system housed on Kaleida’s internal network. Continuing to utilize the Unions’ systems will maintain data integrity, confidentiality, and anonymity for our members. We have been using this system for over a year. We vehemently object to any change that would change the process of complaint submission to the Unions and data sharing with our members and management.

The process per the law was meant to be collaborative and now it appears that management intends to dictate and control everything on short notice. These actions are destructive to our Labor Management relationship. The Unions intend to fight Kaleida Management on this. The integrity of the contract and the Law must be maintained.

We will update you more with further developments and a call for action (as necessary) in days to come.

For now, continue to use the established methods and WHEN YOU’RE SHORT, REPORT!