Health Facilities Evaluator Nurses Pressing for Reasonable Working Expectations
Health Facilities Evaluator Nurses (HFENs) have been working non-stop to ensure that health facilities follow State and Federal laws to protect the public. This has been an especially hard task given that the pandemic has made health facilities an area of great concern.
On September 24, 2021, a Joint Labor Management Committee (JLMC) meeting occurred. A selection of HFENs from the Statewide HFENs United (SHU, a group of HFENs fighting for HFEN rights and concerns), met with CHCQ management to address the unfair practice of assigning HFENs to the supervisory task of reviewing and approving Plans of Correction (POCs).
The JLMC is a powerful tool Local 1000-represented employees use to improve working conditions and issues where management is overstepping with assignments outside the bounds of normal duty assignments.
During the September JLMC, our HEFNs made several key points (among many) surrounding the fact that POC review and approval is a supervisor task; and that the HEFN’s written findings about a health facility are often sterilized by supervisors, with key points of the inspection altered or dropped.
Despite a thorough presentation of the facts, CHCQ management issued a directive that ignored the concerns and continued to compel HEFNs to issue Plans of Corrections. In response, Local 1000 representatives contacted CHCQ management, who refused to rescind the directive.
On October 25, 2021, a Cease & Desist was served on the State by the union on behalf of the HFENs. The Cease & Desist demands that CDPH end the practice of instructing or directing HFENs to perform POC review and/or approval.
Take action!
Please circulate the Cease & Desist within your office if management is requiring HFENs to review and approve facility POCs. This task is a supervisorial task. If management asks for the HFENs help with this task, you should request an ‘Out-of-Class’ assignment for the allotted 90-120 days. Note: An ’Out-of-Class’ assignment gives interested individuals an opportunity for managerial experience, which can be helpful, should you desire to promote in the future. If management still insists you perform the work without out of class designation, you should fill out an Assignment Despite Objection form, and email it to ado@seiu1000.org so we can gather evidence of these directives.
On October 26, 2021, Local 1000 filed an Unfair Labor Practice charge with the Public Employment Relations Board against CDPH arguing that requiring HFENs to Review/Approve POCs violated the prior settlement agreement and constituted an improper unilateral change in violation of the state’s duty to bargain in good faith.
We will keep you updated and apprised of next steps if an acceptable resolution is not met.