Bargaining gains momentum with 2 new tentative agreements

This message was sent on behalf of Lionel Sims, interim senior vice president, Human Resources, Kaiser Foundation Health Plan and Hospitals; and Priya Smith, chief employee human resources officer, The Permanente Medical Group; to Kaiser Permanente’s Northern California mental health and addiction medicine professionals on Wednesday, September 24.

To our mental health and addiction medicine professionals, 

Kaiser Permanente and the National Union of Healthcare Workers met on September 23 to continue negotiating a new agreement for our Northern California mental health and addiction medicine professionals.    

We continue to bargain in good faith and remain committed to reaching an agreement that honors both our patients and therapists.  

Both Kaiser Permanente and NUHW have passed several substantive proposals that have required thoughtful consideration, and we are awaiting responses to some of our proposals. Overall, we believe there has been forward motion and are pleased with the progress made again yesterday. 

We have met 11 times since the start of bargaining in early July and have agreed on 7 additional bargaining sessions through October.

Positive bargaining momentum continues with 2 tentative agreements

Yesterday’s session was positive and productive, resulting in 2 tentative agreements: 

• Nondiscrimination in Article 8: The NUHW bargaining team proposed adding language to expand nondiscrimination protections to include 4 additional categories: gender expression, reproductive health decision-making, genetic information, and military status. While these are already explicitly covered by legal obligations and our long-established companywide policies, we heard the concern and agreed to include the language explicitly in the contract. Our commitment to nondiscrimination and equitable treatment of all employees, physicians, members, and patients is unchanged, our policies and enforcement align to this, and we were able to come together to ensure expanded language in the contract. 
• Student loan repayment letter of agreement: We responded to NUHW’s proposals regarding the student loan repayment program by adding language that demonstrates our commitment to issuing repayments in a timely manner (by June of the subsequent year). We are committed to professional development and retention of our valued mental health professionals and believe this is a positive step toward enhancing that support. 

NUHW presented a counterproposal to Article 26 on union representation related to the total number of shop stewards who would attend paid stewards training, as well as some language changes related to the introduction of new technologies.

We await a response from NUHW to the wage proposal we presented on August 12, which includes 17% across-the-board wage increases over 4 years, maintaining our mental health professionals’ standing as among the highest paid in Northern California.

The next bargaining sessions are on Thursday, September 25, and Tuesday, September 30.  We look forward to returning to the table, present and prepared to tackle outstanding contract items. 

Thank you for your continued commitment to providing high-quality mental health and addiction care to our patients. We remain optimistic that we can soon reach an agreement that works for both parties and delivers high-quality and accessible mental health care to our members and patients.  

For more information, visit kp.org/nuhwbargaining.