Solution-driven unionism may have been the overarching theme of the 2013 joint conference of the AFT Healthcare and AFT Public Employees divisions, but the importance of community engagement was the biggest takeaway message for the 450 AFT members and guests who gathered in Baltimore, April 25-27. Read more.
Please click here to complete our Collective Bargaining Survey. The issues that are important to you are the issues that AFT Healthcare will take to the negotiations this summer when we bargaing a successo
In her latest column appearing in the New York Times, AFT president Randi Weingarten talks about the accomplishments to date of the Affordable Care Act, even in its early stages. And she discusses the vital role that nurses and healthcare workers—the AFT is one of the largest unions of nurses in the country—play in enhancing patient care and improving the healthcare system. Read Weingarten's column.
The 3 percent increase negotiated by AFT-Healthcare-Maryland and the Maryland Professional Employees Council for state workers in
AFT Healthcare-Maryland president Debra Perry reports that a bill before the Maryland Senate intended to strengthen violence prevention standards in health care facilities across the state has been withdrawn.
Reportedly, the bill’s sponsor, Senator Katherine Klausmeier (D), was told by nursing home representatives that they already have sufficient standards and methods for dealing with workplace violence. Delegate Tom Hucker (D), who introduced a similar bill in the Maryland House of Representatives, expressed disappointment at the Senate bill’s withdrawal.
The leaders of two labor organizations representing healthcare professionals announced on Feb. 14 that they have approved an affiliation agreement that will bring 34,000 registered nurses into the AFT, the largest union of professionals in the AFL-CIO.