UN UNAGREEABLE AGREEMENT
Published in the Dec. 20, 2025 issue.
The testy labor dispute is over, but the anger and bitter feelings are still festering between union employees and the Northern Inyo Hospital District board and leadership.
Nurses and technical workers at NIHD voted overwhelmingly to approve new contract terms on Thursday, Dec. 11. The NIHD board then approved the new deal on Dec. 17. Those two approvals staved off a strike by hundreds of NIHD union workers and stopped plans by the district to spend up to $900,000 to ship in nurses to maintain operations for a week if the strike occurred.
Although the union said it was “pleased” with the new agreement, the labor negotiations did not end on a conciliatory note.
“These negotiations were symptomatic of larger problems which need to be addressed. Morale will only improve once employees and our community can depend upon a District Leadership that demonstrates good judgement, makes better decisions, and respects its frontline employees,” stated a press release from the union, Local 315 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME).
“I’ve been on every single RN Negotiating Team since the formation of the Union in 2015,” said Heleen Welvaart, an RN in the Rural Health Clinic. “This has been the most difficult round of negotiations I can remember. Until this year, we have never had to take a strike vote at Northern Inyo.”
That vote was met with a strident response by the NIHD board during a special meeting on Dec. 5. The board met in executive session and essentially handed CEO Christian Wallis a $900,000 blank check to bring in temporary traveling nurses to replace NIH nurses during the planned four-day nurses’ strike. The meeting minutes did not break out how that money would be spent to muster a “contingency” force of up to 100 nurses.
The pay for the nurses was not disclosed. Nor did the minutes outline how the district would get the replacement nurses to Bishop, either via plane or bus or a combo of both, and how much it would cost to house and feed them in town for five days. There was no indication the district would seek to replace tech staff, which were going to strike for only one day.
In the ten days from the vote to the planned strike, the union had been prepared to negotiate a process that would have allowed a group of union nurses to work during the strike to provide essential and emergency care and services. That offer was rejected and NIHD adopted the plan to bring in enough nurses to avoid any interruption of care in the hospital and clinics.
Union representatives took offense, again, to the repeated claim by NIHD that it provides a 2.5% annual raise to all employees. As previously reported in The Sheet, employees at the final step of their salary scale do not get the 2.5% raise. That policy was confirmed by a memo obtained by The Sheet from the NIHD personnel office to non-represented workers about the pending pay changes. The memo states, the annual 2.5% “step increase” is only paid to “eligible employees … not at the top of their pay scale.”
Negotiations between NIHD and the union stalled in October over the Cost-of-Living Adjustment (COLA). The union requested the 3.5% COLA slated to take effect in November. The district didn’t want to pay any COLA, and sought to delay any COLA or salary negotiations until spring of 2026 because of its shaky financial position caused by running a $6 million budget deficit and unknown impacts of cuts to federal healthcare funding.
Eventually, both sides agreed to a 2.5% COLA for each of the next three years, which AFSCME called “modest.” The negotiations were mediated by representatives from the state and took all day. The union negotiating team and attorneys from NIHD’s outside law firm were at the table.
The final agreement also led to the union withdrawing its Unfair Labor Practices complaint with to the California Public Employment Relations Board.
Union concerns about nurse staffing levels and ratios that led to the Unfair Labor Practices complaint were “partially” addressed by acknowledging “the importance of the bedside RN’s voice in decision making,” AFSCME said.
The agreement ends the practice of forcing employees to cash in paid-time-off hours to receive holiday pay when their department is closed. Now employees can opt for “no pay” on holidays and retain their paid time off. Slight increases in standby pay and extended medical health insurance coverage for employees with long-term illnesses were also in the new agreement.
“While the Union is pleased with the agreement, union leaders have serious concerns about the District’s behavior in bargaining and the consequences for the workforce and community at large,” the AFSCME press release states. “We made reasonable proposals, which should not have been this hard or taken this long to achieve.”
An NIHD press release stated, “the District appreciates the union’s participation throughout this process and recognizes the significance of this step toward restoring stability for patients, staff, and the community.”
AFSCME represents separate bargaining units for roughly 100 nurses and about 230 tech workers, a group that includes medical assistants, admissions clerks, kitchen staff, lab and radiology techs, licensed vocational nurses, certified nursing assistants, environmental services staff, and specialty clinic technical staff.
