San Jose hospital workers who responded to Gilroy mass shooting say their jobs are in jeopardy
Hospital workers at O’Connor Hospital in San Jose say their employment is in jeopardy after a $235 million acquisition by Santa Clara County in March-despite being told they could keep their jobs.
The county’s bid for San Jose’s O’Connor Hospital and Gilroy’s St. Louise Regional Hospital was approved by a bankruptcy court in Los Angeles on Dec. 27. The hospitals previously belonged to Verity Health System, which declared bankruptcy in August 2018.
The county successfully completed the sale in March after a challenge from the state attorney general’s office, and transitioned about 1,600 employees into the public health system.
County officials said the sale would ensure employees who wanted to remain at both hospitals could keep their jobs, but employees with the Service Employees International Union Local 521 in San Jose say they’ve had to take challenging tests and face the possibility of layoff notices in the last month.
Jeffrey Spouder has worked at O’Connor for about 16 years as a stock clerk. He took a roughly 60-question test about three weeks ago, and said only a handful of questions had to do with stocking. The rest addressed filing, matching, decision-making and situational questions that Spouder said were designed for management-level positions, but had nothing to do with his job.
The testing also wasn’t suited for people who speak English as a second language, Spouder said, and undermines workers who have dozens of years of hard-earned experience in their fields.
“We were promised that our jobs were gonna be safe, and now, everybody has had anxiety-people with families, mothers and fathers-they’ve had to stress over this situation,” Spouder said.
In a statement Thursday, the county said it is supporting its employees as they move through a “necessary civil service process.” John Mills, director of the county’s employee services agency, said workers have been given a one-year temporary or provisional employment status.
“Any temporary employees seeking permanent employment need to apply and participate in the competitive recruitment process,” he said, explaining that the testing was developed by human resources and department
managers to determine employee success.
Spouder passed the test and is up to re-interview for his current job. A majority of the group also passed the test, but those who didn’t may be replaced. Carlton Allen, a licensed vocational nurse and negotiator for the union, said at least a couple employees have received tentative 90-day notices from their managers, but not in writing. He said the confusion is being aggravated by a lack of communication between employee services and the
human relations department.
At a news conference outside O’Connor Hospital on Thursday afternoon, union CEO Riko Mendez said “frontline” hospital workers who organize intake, clean surgery tools, prepare rooms and clean facilities are the backbone of the county’s public health system, which serves low-income residents and those in need.
He said the workers now fearing for their jobs are the same ones who responded without hesitation after a gunman fatally shot three people and injured 13 others at the Gilroy Garlic Festival on July 28.
“During the critical moments after the horrible tragedy at the Gilroy Garlic Festival, it was public employees-new employees here at O’Connor Hospital-that responded as heroes,” Mendez said. “People showed up off-shift to do anything that they could to help the families and the injured.”
He emphasized the workers’ collective years of experience, and said a test should not prevent them from doing the jobs they love.
The union is requesting that County Executive Jeffrey Smith bring officials from both employee services and human resources to the bargaining table. If the county does not comply, the union may organize a strike of over
12,000 employees in the coming months.
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