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Cooley Dickinson Hospital Service Workers Win a Voice for Quality Care and Good Jobs

Approximately 300 service workers join state’s largest and fastest growing healthcare union; technical workers await final vote outcome

Northampton, MA (July 21, 2017) – Service workers at Cooley Dickinson Hospital voted to join 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East, the largest and fastest growing healthcare union in Massachusetts. Cooley Dickinson Hospital is located in Northampton and is part of Partners HealthCare.

The unit of nearly 300 service workers includes administrative, transport and food service staff, as well as medical interpreters and phlebotomists.

“I voted yes to join 1199SEIU to have a more fair playing field for employees, to be treated with respect and fairness and to have support when we need it,” said Deanna Williams, an Administrative Assistant at Cooley Dickinson Hospital for eleven years.

"Through a free and fair election process, service workers at Cooley Dickinson Hospital joined together and will now use the strength of their united voice to better advocate for themselves and their families while continuing to provide the quality care their patients need and deserve,” said Tyrék D. Lee, Sr., Executive Vice President of 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East. “We are proud to welcome our new Cooley Dickinson sisters and brothers into our 1199SEIU family and look forward to working with them to ensure all workers – including those not yet unionized – have good jobs, fair wages and respect, dignity and a voice in the workplace.”

The service and technical workers at Cooley Dickinson Hospital participated in a free and fair election process that began on May 15 and allowed workers to make their own decisions about whether or not to join 1199SEIU. The units voted in separate, secret-ballot elections conducted by the National Labor Relations Board. The result of the technical unit’s vote will be determined once ballot challenges are resolved. The technical unit of approximately 100 workers includes medical lab technicians, CV techs and respiratory therapists.

“It is our hope that the outcome of the technical unit’s vote can be resolved expeditiously,” Lee added. “In the meantime, we continue to stand with the technical workers at Cooley Dickinson Hospital in their effort to gain a voice for quality care and good jobs.”

The Cooley Dickinson Hospital service workers are among hundreds of additional healthcare workers who recently voted to join 56,000 1199SEIU members in Massachusetts and over 400,000 members on the East Coast. In March, approximately 500 service workers at Brigham and Women’s Faulkner Hospital in Boston, also a Partners HealthCare facility, and 80 technical workers at Nashoba Valley Medical Center in Ayer, part of the Steward Health Care System, joined 1199SEIU. Over 40 workers at Brockton Visiting Nurses Association joined 1199SEIU in October 2016, and over 200 workers at Medical Resources, a private home care agency based in Newton, voted to join the union in May 2015.

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Representing more than 56,000 healthcare workers throughout Massachusetts and over 450,000 workers on the East Coast, 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East is the largest and fastest-growing healthcare union in America. Our mission is to achieve affordable, high quality healthcare for all. 1199SEIU is part of the 2.1 million member Service Employees International Union.