In Business Las Vegas, April 6th, 2007
Before a judge, Valley Hospital's HR administrator said she fired a former union steward for telling lies about patients missing medications and sitting in their own excrement.
Joan
Wells
, the fired nurse
, said she was scared to tell hospital officials exactly when and how those problems happened. She feared for her license and career, as well for her co-workers.
After being suspended then fired, she testified in court more than five months later.
Wells
wanted her job back, plus back pay and wages.
It is one of two remaining charges that Service Employees International Union Local 1107 has against the Valley Health System. The other is a similar situation:
Nurse
Christina
Schofield
was fired from Desert Springs Hospital. Her hearing is set for April 16.
The union and the two hospitals fought for nine months over a new contract. Over that time dozens of charges were filed with the National Labor Relations Board. Before
Wells
' March 27 hearing, only a few other charges made it that far: The hospitals had accused the union of intimidating workers, but those were found to be unsubstantiated. The remaining charges were dropped as the two sides shook hands on a new deal.
Now an administrative law judge must decide whether Valley Hospital broke the law. Did it fire
Wells
for her union activities? Or did
Wells
make up malicious lies to further the union's bargaining goals, then try to protect herself with her union status?
Dana
Thorne
, the HR administrator
, testified that the firing had to do with
Wells
' statements published in a Las Vegas Review-Journal article, on the SEIU-run Web site QualityCare-Nevada.org, and on fliers posted around the hospital after she was fired.
The hospital's first reaction was to investigate the claims of patient mistreatment, she said. After
Wells
put off a meeting a few times — she wanted a union representative present — hospital officials could not get her to give specific times, dates or names related to her accusations.
Company policy tells nurses to report patient safety problems. It also forbids employees from making false statements about the hospital.
"We stepped back and said: If this is a regular employee of the hospital, what would we do?"
Thorne
said. "Her union activities should not allow her to do this type of stuff that nobody else would be able to get away with."
A few weeks later
Wells
led a group of intensive care unit nurses who refused to take on three or four patients, rather than the standard two. That was not an official reason for
Wells
' firing, though it did lead to what the hospital called false statements in the union's flyer.
Thorne
said she never knew
Wells
was a union steward, let alone a chief union steward.
"If anything she gave up all protection of the (National Labor Relations) Act by her behavior," said
Ray
Carey
, Valley's lawyer.
But
Wells
' lawyer, and a lawyer for the NLRB, attempted to prove that the incidents occurred within the context of a labor fight.
"She had represented the union strongly," said
Joel
Schochet
, attorney
with the NLRB. "The hospital did this because, well, they didn't like these statements."
Wells
testified about the tension she felt when questioned by the hospital staff and about her reluctance to go into detail about the accusations. She had been trying to illustrate that the hospital was understaffed and needed to set nurse-patient ratios in its contract.
"If a medication is given late you're supposed to circle it on the record and write the time you gave it at," she said.
Most nurses just skip that process, she said. "You can be disciplined if somebody does a chart review and it shows you're consistently late with medication."
When questioned about specifics, she gave the hospital officials a no-answer reply: "I said it was a general statement."
Judge
Lana
Park
from the
San Francisco
NLRB office will make a decision on the case. If the hospital is found at fault, it will have to rehire
Wells
, pay lost wages and benefits and post a notice informing employees of their union rights.
In other NLRB news, the agency made a complaint against Bellagio over the failed organizing campaign of the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 501. The case is set to go to hearing on May 1.
The complaint accused Bellagio of illegal actions starting in August, including interrogating employees about their union sympathies, promising employees increased benefits if they rejected the union, threatening pro-union workers and banning union talk on company time.
Bellagio managers in October fired one worker, Steve
Bielen
, for helping the union, the NLRB said.
David
Carr
, the resort's facility manager, and
Keith
Roederer
, its electrical shop supervisor, are pointed out in the complaint.
In response, the Bellagio's lawyers denied all the allegations.
