Nurses at the University Medical Center of New Orleans will unionize.
According to the National Nurses Organizing Committee, a supermajority of the nurses at the hospital agreed to organize, making UMC the first private-sector hospital in Louisiana to be unionized. The NNOC says 82 percent of nurses voted "yes" during the three-day voting period that ended Saturday.
“This is a historic day for UMC, for New Orleans and the surrounding area, and for all of Louisiana and the South,” Dionne Jones, a registered nurse in the in-house nurse pool at UMC, said in a statement. “Nurses at our hospital wanted a voice so we can speak up for our patients and ourselves, and we wanted a seat at the table to be involved in shaping the future of our hospital. Now that we’ve won our union, we have both.”
UMC nurses will now form their bargaining team and prepare for contract negotiations with the hospital.
