By Steve Wishnia

Frustrated after eight months of fruitless negotiations to reach their first union contract, professional and clinical home health-care workers in Rochester have voted to authorize a strike of up to three days long.

The about 110 workers at the University of Rochester Medicine Home Care (URMHC) agency, part of the University of Rochester Medical Center network, voted to join 1199SEIU last March. They provide services for patients recently released from the hospital such as nursing care, social work, and physical, occupational, and speech therapy.

They began contract talks last May, but management “is really standing on status quo,” lead negotiator Tracey Harrison, the union’s vice president for the Rochester-Corning region, told Work-Bites during a break in bargaining sessions Jan. 31. “Unfortunately, we’re spending a lot of time talking about the same thing we talked about ten or twelve sessions ago.”

“Home Care leadership has been bargaining in good faith since May of 2024 in a sincere effort to make progress towards reaching an initial contract, and has reached tentative agreement with the union on many proposals,” an agency spokesperson said in a statement. “We will continue to negotiate in good faith and work to reach an agreement that is fair to all Home Care employees, those who are represented by the union, and those who are not.”

More than 80% of the workers in the bargaining unit voted to approve a possible strike, according to 1199SEIU. The union will hold an “informational picket” outside URMHC’s offices in the Rochester suburb of Webster later this afternoon, Feb. 3.

It would have to give 10 days’ notice before any possible walkout, as legally required for health-care workers.

Overwork & ‘astronomical’ health costs

The union says there are still 14 outstanding economic issues on the table, but the main ones are affordable health-insurance coverage for workers, pay, and reasonable patient caseloads. Their standard caseload is 30 visits to patients per week.

“It makes it difficult to spend enough time,” says Tara Petersen, a longtime physical therapist assistant who has worked for URMHC for nine years. “They are still very ill.” They typically need care for several weeks, she adds, and some don’t have any family in the area.

They see patients in seven counties in Rochester and the surrounding rural areas, a radius of 50 to 60 miles, so they can drive as much as 100 miles in a day to see six patients. With travel time and recently increased paperwork, Petersen says, her eight-hour workday stretches to nine or 9 1/2 hours.

“It’s not sustainable,” says Harrison. He added that 1199SEIU originally sought to lower the caseload to 25 visits per week, and thought it had reached a compromise on 27, but management twice reneged on that, insisting on keeping it at 30.

Another issue is what Petersen calls the “astronomically priced and inadequate” health insurance that workers have the option to buy through their employer. URMHC, she said, recently switched to a more expensive plan with less than two months’ notice. Harrison says coverage for one couple now costs $8,500 a year in premiums—more than $700 a month—with an annual deductible of more than $15,000.

Management has also reduced pay and time off—sick days, personal days, and holidays—recently, they say.

All this has contributed to massive turnover. More than 200 URMHC workers have quit in the past three years, says Harrison. The agency says it has fewer than 400 employees.

“The burden is on those who are left,” says Petersen.

The home-care workers’ retirement plan is also significantly below that for other URMC employees. The medical network generally contributes 6.2% of workers’ salaries to the pension fund, plus 10% more of pay above $63,000 a year, says Harrison, while for URMHC workers, it puts in 3%, recently raised from 1%.

The University of Rochester is the largest private-sector employer in upstate New York. The URMHC spokesperson said that while the agency is owned by the university, its management and labor relations are separate from the university and its medical center.

1199SEIU filed unfair-labor-practice charges against URMHC with the National Labor Relations Board last month, after its new CEO, Greg Hutton, refused to meet directly with union leaders. It accused the agency of bargaining in bad faith.

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