Voting Underway By Nurses From AMITA St. Joseph Medical Center

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Nurses from AMITA St. Joseph Medical Center in Joliet are voting on a new contract proposal. More than 700 nurses walked off the job on July 4th. Today marks the 16th day of the strike.

Nurses represented by the Illinois Nurses Association at AMITA St. Joseph’s Medical Center rejected a previous three-year contract, citing a failure by AMITA to adequately address short staffing within the hospital.

INA made nurse and patient safety issues a priority and remained firm in emphasizing an improvement on staffing issues at the hospital. INA had pushed for a number of improvements in staffing, including limits on the maximum number of patients that can be assigned to a nurse at one time and making current staffing grids enforceable.

INA represents more than 720 nurses who work at the hospital and both sides had been in negotiations on a new contract since early Spring. The existing contract expired on May 9th and the nurses began their unfair labor practice strike on July 4th.