St. Luke's Hospital nurses and its management this morning reached a tentative agreement on a contract and avoided a possible strike, according to John Nemo, Minnesota Nurses Association spokesman.
The resolution came at 6 a.m. today, 17 hours after the negotiation session began.
St. Luke's nurses are expected to vote to ratify the contract Sept. 8. Voting will take place at United Baptist Church, 830 E. First St., from 6:30 a.m. to 8 p.m.
The agreement includes:
# Joint development and implementation of staffing plans, which includes mediation for impasse resolution
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# Both sides agreed on temporarily closing the unit to admissions when they're unable to safely provide care for the next admission.
# Both sides agreed on how the code of conduct will work.
# Kentucky River protections continue through the course of the contract.
Meanwhile, nurses at St. Mary's Medical Center are without a contract.
The MNA represents the 958 registered nurses at SMDC and 420 at St. Luke's hospital. Nurses at both hospitals voted overwhelmingly Aug. 18 to reject contract offers and authorized a one-day strike. A 10-day notice is required before the union members can strike, and that has not yet happened at SMDC.
SMDC began planning for a possible strike since nurses at 14 Twin Cities area hospitals held a one-day strike on June 10, SMDC spokeswoman Kim Kaiser said Thursday.
"We've been planning and are confident that we will be able to continue to provide quality patient care in the event of a work stoppage," she said. "Of course, it was planning we hoped we would not need to use."
Union leaders insist the sticking point is patient safety, not wages. SMDC is offering nurses a three-year wage package that Twin Cities nurses recently received: no raise this year, 1 percent in year two and 2 percent the third year. The Duluth nurses' contracts expired June 30.
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Kaiser said another stumbling block to a settlement seems to be the size of the employer contribution for health insurance premiums.
News Tribune staff writer Steve Kuchera contributed to this report.
