N.J. Supreme Court: Striking Nurses Entitled to Unemployment Benefits

[Omaha Steve]

http://blog.aflcio.org/2009/02/11/nj-supreme-court-striking-nurses-entitled-to-unemployment-benefits/

This post brought to us by Katrina Blomdahl, writer-researcher for RNs Working Together, which is a coalition of 10 AFL-CIO unions, representing more than 250,000 nurses nationwide.

Sometimes justice comes in ways you least expect it.

That’s the case for nearly 100 nurses from Willingboro, N.J., represented by JNESO. Two weeks ago, the New Jersey Supreme Court ruled that striking nurses at Lourdes Medical Center of Burlington County, a 259-bed nonprofit hospital, were entitled to unemployment benefits for the time they spent on picket lines.


Barbara Jones, RN, worked at Lourdes Medical Center for 28 years before the strike. “There was no rhyme or reason for what they did. I think it was their goal to destroy the union.”


(JNESO, which refers to the Union Division of the State Nurses Association, began in 1958 as the Jersey Nurses Economic Security Organization and now is affiliated with the Operating Engineers union.)

The strike started in 2004 and lasted for two years. The workers who filed for unemployment at the beginning of the strike in 2004 were ruled to be eligible for 26 weeks of benefits. New Jersey law allows striking workers to collect unemployment benefits, provided they do not cause their employer to suffer a “stoppage of work.”

In a 6-1 decision, the court ruled the nurses were entitled to their benefits because the hospital continued to maintain its patient levels and “function at full service.”

JNESO Executive Director Virginia Treacy, RN, says the hospital

assured the community that everything was fine. They took out ads saying that the quality of care had not changed. And they hired nurses from the U.S. Nursing Corporation to replace us.

FULL story at link.