FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Tuesday, November 7, 2023
CONTACT: Megan Othersen Gorman / [email protected] / (215) 817-5781
RNs, LPNs, Dietitians, and Social Workers at Delco’s Fair Acres Geriatric Center Picket Outside The Facility to Show Their Employer That They Will Stand Together – Quite Literally – To Protect Their Patients and Themselves
Media, PA – At a time when healthcare workers in the Philadelphia area and nationwide are fleeing their jobs, seeking better working conditions to improve quality of care and protect both their patients and themselves, Delaware County – owner and operator of Fair Acres Geriatric Center – has proposed changes to the Fair Acres nurses’, dietitians’, and social workers’ contract that would hinder retention of seasoned workers, make recruitment all the more difficult, and exacerbate the staffing problems inside the facility.
“We are nurses who serve the public sector – we need our elected county public officials to serve us as well,” says Ericka Schneider, BSN, RN, a 30-year Fair Acres nurse and member of Fair Acres United.
Fair Acres management has proposed that workers pay more out of pocket for healthcare. They have proposed a wage scale that is actually less than the current scale, in effect creating a two-tiered wage scale where new hires would be making less.
Their proposed cuts to the Union’s contract would only exacerbate the facility’s staffing problems – management consistently mandates Fair Acres professionals due to short staffing – and further overwork their already exhausted staff.
“We are vital to our community,” says Schneider. “We deserve to work in a well-staffed facility and in an environment conducive to caring for complex patients/residents with ever-changing acuity levels. We deserve respect, to be treated fairly, and to be valued as the excellent professionals we are. And we deserve, at the very least, to be able to schedule meetings with management to have open discussions about our contract.”
Now in their fifth month of bargaining post-contract expiration and after more than six weeks of radio silence from management, during which no bargaining sessions were scheduled, Fair Acres United members have had enough.
“Back in July, Fair Acres was given a 5-star rating by the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services for the second time in the last three years, and last November, Fair Acres was named one of the best nursing homes in the U.S. by Newsweek magazine!” says Tiffanie Headley, LPN, a Fair Acres nurse. “We, the nurses, social workers, and dietitians who provide care for our residents, are a huge part of that distinction! Where is the respect for our work? Where is our fair contract?”
“We are committed to not just taking care of Delaware County’s most vulnerable population but to doing so with pride, compassion, and love for our residents,” she says. “All we ask for in return is a fair contract with fair wages and healthcare to attract and retain more caregivers so that we can care for our residents the way we want to and the way they deserve.”
Fair Acres United is an affiliate of PASNAP, the Pennsylvania Association of Staff Nurses and Allied Professionals, which represents nearly 10,000 frontline nurses and healthcare professionals across the Commonwealth and was founded on the belief that patients receive the best care when clinical-care staff have a strong voice to advocate for both patients and themselves.
