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Hospital Nurses Announce Strike

A strike by nurses is looming at a western Massachusetts hospital.

Nurses at Baystate Franklin Medical Center in Greenfield have called a 24-hour strike starting at 7 a.m. Monday February 10. The announcement came after hospital management declared an impasse in the 28 months of contract negotiations and moved to unilaterally implement its final offer.  Union leader Donna Stern said hospital officials left the 200 nurses with little recourse.

" Nurses don't want to go on strike. But nurses also know they have to protect their practice, which ultimately protects patients."

A hospital spokesman said the one day strike would not be helpful to the community or the nurses.  The key sticking point in the protracted dispute is the hospital’s insistence on calculating overtime on a weekly rather than a daily basis.

The record-setting tenure of Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno. The 2011 tornado and its recovery that remade the largest city in Western Massachusetts. The fallout from the deadly COVID outbreak at the Holyoke Soldiers Home. Those are just a few of the thousands and thousands of stories WAMC’s Pioneer Valley Bureau Chief Paul Tuthill has covered for WAMC in his nearly 17 years with the station.