Evening, membership. Hope that you all get some time to rest and relax this weekend and over the coming week.
We had another bargaining session on Thursday. It did get a little contentious. I will get to that. However we did get two tentative agreements.
We had asked for some different language rather than stating we could not disparage Legacy. Their side was to have that prepared for today. They did not initially, but after a caucus, they were able to do so. We tentatively agreed to their language. We also agreed to adopt the current Legacy drug and alcohol policy into the contract.
That was all we could agree on. We are seeking better support for our members who are breastfeeding than the very generic language leadership wants to put in. Their argument is that it has to be vague in order to comply with federal and state law and that there’s no reason to treat the primary care doctors and APP’s different from any other group (this argument will be made again and again and again). We countered that there is no reason to be satisfied with the bare minimum. We have agreed to come back to this as leadership has flatly said that our language is not acceptable to them. We’re asking for a room with a sink and a locking or otherwise lockable door that is not a bathroom and to not have the time we are pumping count against us. I wouldn’t have thought this ask was as controversial as it was.
There are protections for people who are pumping and breastfeeding. If people would like more information, PLEASE email us and we will send you in the information. Also, if you are having issues with getting time to pump/breastfeed and/or having a safe and clean place to do so (yes, the bathroom does NOT count), please tell us. We’re here to advocate for you and to get Legacy to do what they should. Also be on the lookout for survey on this subject.
We also had a contentious time over the length of probationary period. Leadership wants 12 months. We want 6 months. Their argument again is that that is what other groups are doing and it would be hard for them to keep track as well as the union. We found the last argument not compelling and we clarified that no, the union would not find it hard to keep track of different probationary timelines. The argument devolved into leadership asking why they should treat primary care differently. We did try to explain, but explanations were interrupted or not heard. I also was told by Legacy’s lawyer that I should be smarter than what I said. He further compared us to children in a family wanting something different than the other kids. Legacy’s lawyer again threatened to blow up what we had agree to so far because we are wanting something different than others. We ended bargaining at that time as clearly it was no longer productive.
Of note, the specialist APP’s have also butted heads with this lawyer. A letter of no confidence was given to Legacy leaders on Thursday in direct response to his behavior at their bargaining table. He has been very frustrating for us and we are disappointed in leadership allowing him to behave as he has.
We have another bargaining session on April 3rd, 2025 which is in about two weeks. We will be arguing at that time why primary care is different. If anyone wants to help us craft those arguments, we’d love to hear them. Please send them to legacypcpunion@gmail.com
This reminds me-we are looking for another APP to join the bargaining team. Time commitment is a one hour weekly Zoom meeting on Tuesday’s at 8 pm and bargaining sessions which are averaging about once every 1-2 weeks for about 2 hours. These are currently virtual and start at 4:30 pm. Anyone interested either get in touch with me (Kar-yee Wu 503-381-3182), Chris Stamatakos 360-521-3916, or Sam Luebke 202-679-5497.
In much happier news, we’ve had great response to people wanting a webinar on how we’re paid. I didn’t respond individually to everyone who sent emails because of life, but THANK YOU for your responses. We will hold this webinar on May 1st, 2025. More details to come. We will also take time then to explore what you all want in terms of compensation. The economic issues are going to be challenging, but we are committed to getting our membership the best contract we can.
Also in the happy news front, we are working on getting rid of the pay cap even before we have a contract. Nothing is finalized and of course it has to go through compensation committee, but we are hopeful this will happen. Updates as they become available.
Again, please reach out to us. We have a Signal chat where I post these updates. If you know of someone who is not connected to us, please send them our way.
Thank you for reading.
Kar-yee