SOUTH DAYTONA – Health care workers at 11 nursing homes across the state took to the streets Thursday to protest what they say is unfair pay and demand better protections and safer staffing.
One of these protests took place at Oaktree Healthcare nursing home in South Daytona on Reed Canal Road. The facility, which is operated by Aspire Health Group, is also known as Aspire at South Daytona.
The employees there are among the thousands who belong to 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East – the largest union for healthcare workers in Florida with more than 25,000 members in the state.
“We are having this strike today because we want a fair collective bargaining agreement,” Darrell Butler, a certified nursing assistant (CNA) who works at the South Daytona facility, said in an interview. “We want better wages because $15 (an hour) is not enough to feed our families.”
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Butler, a delegate from 1199SEIU, said he hopes Aspire Health Group “comes to the bargaining table … and meets our demands to support our families and the nursing home.” The company operates the 11 facilities where workers went on strike Thursday afternoon.
A message sent to Aspire Health Group was not immediately returned.
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Negotiations began in June, Butler said, but recently failed.
According to a union press release, “contracts between 1199SEIU workers and management at nearly 50 Florida facilities will expire this year, directly impacting more than 4,000 licensed nursing assistants, dietitians, cleaners and other employees, as well as 10,000 patients.”
“Florida’s nursing home industry generates unexpected revenue each year, billions of which are funded with our tax dollars,” Margarette Nerette, vice president of long-term care at 1199SEIU Florida, said in the press release. “These businesses must put care first while adequately paying and protecting the caregivers who care for our parents, grandparents and other elderly loved ones.”
Butler said workers at the South Daytona facility and others across the state are demanding “safer staffing levels” in nursing homes in addition to better pay.
“Governor Ron DeSantis increased the ratio of hours we spend on our residents from 2.5 to 2.0 (per patient). So we’re providing two hours of care, and that’s not enough,” Butler said. “Many of us are overworked. We hurt our backs, we hurt our legs.”
The nurse-to-patient ratio mentioned by Butler “represents the number of patients a registered nurse cares for during a shift. Most hospitals have policies to ensure a safe staffing ratio,” says Nurse Journal.
He explained that some of the facility’s residents are “full-care patients,” meaning they require the assistance of a caregiver with feeding, bathing and dressing, “and that takes time.” Oaktree Healthcare is a 65-bed facility.
Although there are 20 nurses on staff, not all of them work at the facility at the same time. In a three-shift schedule on a given day, only three nurses are on duty per shift to care for the average 10 to 15 residents, Butler said.
“They want us to come in and get the job done in 10, 15 minutes,” he said. “If you have to shower someone, sometimes it can take 30 minutes to an hour.”
The problem goes “much deeper” than just pay
Gary Alberstadt, who also works as a nurse at the facility, shared Butler and the union’s concerns, saying the problem goes “much deeper” than just what they see as inadequate pay.
“It’s sad because we don’t have to work as much, which in turn affects the patients,” said Alberstadt at the strike demonstration on Thursday. “How can you take adequate care of 20 patients for eight hours when you still have to take 15-minute breaks, lunch, documentation, training, etc.? That’s at the expense of personal care.”
Alberstadt has worked at the South Daytona Nursing Home for three years, but has also worked at other locations in Volusia County during his eight-year career as a nurse.
“There are a lot of good employees who are here because they love their job, because they love the patients,” he said. “At the end of the day, it’s a fulfilling and rewarding job – it really is.”
Butler, who has worked as a nurse for more than 15 years, said the situation has been bad for just as long, if not longer.
“Now it’s gotten a little worse because many facilities only take in homeless people, people with serious illnesses that we can’t treat – mental illnesses,” he said.
“We get beaten up a lot and there is no protection for the workers, there is only protection for the residents. So if we hurt our back and they hit us in the face and we get a black eye, there is nothing we can do about it,” he added.
Butler expressed his hope that the union and management would be able to reach an agreement.
“If we have the manpower and the community behind us, and we make it clear to management that we are overworked and underpaid, then I think things can improve,” he said.
