Celia Emmons, a lactation consultant at Magee-Women’s Hospital at the University of Pennsylvania, addresses the audience at an event sponsored by SEIU Healthcare Pennsylvania on August 7. (Photo courtesy of SEIU Healthcare Pennsylvania.)
This story was originally published by Capital & Main.
Almost 1,000 registered nurses at a pittsburgh hospital will vote on whether to join a union starting august 19, according to a decision from that region’s National Labor Relations Board office earlier this month. The vote, which runs through Aug. 23, will determine whether nurses from the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center Magee-Womens Hospital will join SEIU Healthcare Pennsylvania.
The campaign attracted significant local support, including efforts by local officials to collect complaints from residents about union busting.
Setting an election schedule is the latest confirmation that in the case of the National Labor Relations Board, union elections cannot be suspended due to the lack of a quorum on the board.
Alexia Kulwiec, an associate professor in the School of Workforce at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, wrote in an email that “NLRB regional directors have absolute authority to conduct elections, even without a quorum of NLRB board members.”
Nurses First they filed a petition for union elections on May 27. They organized to build support for the union from at least 2024, citing insufficient employment levels, overwork and an cloudy pay and benefits system.
The University of Pittsburgh Medical Center did not respond to requests for comment.
“My passion is to provide the highest quality care to my patients,” said Celia Emmons, lactation consultant at UPMC Magee-Womens Hospital. “We want to have a seat at the table and have a say in the decisions that are made,” Emmons said.
In early June, the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center responded to the nurses’ petition with two arguments, neither of which convinced the National Labor Relations Board.
The first argument concerned whether some nurses could join the union at all. UPMC argued that senior nurses who perform rotating management responsibilities – constitute over 20% proposed entity – are supervisory persons and are therefore not entitled to vote. The NLRB’s regional office rejected that claim, paving the way for everyone else 940 nurses to participate in elections; a compact proportion will vote “contestable”, and their votes will only be counted if they can influence the final result.
The hospital’s second argument concerned the lack of a quorum for the National Labor Relations Board following President Donald Trump’s January decision firing board member Gwynne Wilcox, leaving the five-person board with just two members. The medical center argued that the lack of a quorum prevented the board from delegating authority to county boards that typically handle elections.
The NLRB in Pittsburgh scheduled the election without addressing the quorum issue, but other regional boards rejected that argument. In July, the NLRB’s Florida office made the same argument: “without merit” Its decision cited six previous cases dating back to 2010 that upheld the power of regional directors to oversee elections.
The campaign also inspired Pittsburgh’s Allegheny County Executive Sara Innamorato to launch a tool to assist workers report suspected labor rights violations. An Allegheny County spokesperson told Capital & Main that the county has developed “Right to Organize Event Report Form” in response to the Trump administration’s anti-union efforts. While the county does not have the same authority as the NLRB to ensure employers comply with labor laws, a county spokesman said the form is a way to support and draw attention to workers’ rights.
Emmons said University of Pittsburgh Medical Center’s anti-union efforts are “disrupting patient care” by diverting nurses from patients’ bedsides in favor of mandatory lectures on the negative impact of unions on wages and benefits. She said she was “grateful” that the form was launched.
The form includes, among others: note that it is “for informational purposes only” so the office can “understand the experiences of workers expressing their right to organize,” adding that formal reports should go through the NLRB.
Emmons stated that several nurses used the form to file complaints about anti-union activity.
For her part, Emmons hopes she won’t have to file any complaints for a while. After working at the hospital for 10 years and first talking about a possible relationship more than two years ago, he is looking forward to the upcoming vote. “We are entrusted with the lives of people in our communities,” she said. “We should also be trusted [help] make decisions that impact our patients and us as employees.”
