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Public Employee Press
Out-of-title grievance
wins back pay for 23 It took a stand-up woman to put her foot
down and lead the fight that won a long-standing grievance for Local 1549 members
at Jacobi Medical Center in the Bronx.
Emergency Room Clerical Associate
Cynthia Ladson pressed a group out-of-title work grievance, and five years later
23 members are reaping the benefit.
Its about standing up for
whats right, said Ladson. I believed it was important and I
tried to get everybody else to believe in it too!
Ladson and other
Level II ClericalAssociates were routinely assigned work that went beyond their
job descriptions, including more difficult tasks that required independent judgment.
When earlier grievance steps yielded no progress, the union took the case to an
arbitrator who ruled Oct. 6 that the members were doing Level III work.
Council
Rep Eddie Douglass and Grievance Rep Efrain Perez dealt with the grievance steps
and DC 37 attorney Steven Sykes handled the arbitration. The members continued
to bring us up-to-date information, and that helped win the arbitration,
said Perez.
Now the members are awaiting their checks. They will be paid
the difference between the pay of the two titles for as long after they filed
the grievance as they were in Level II doing Level III work. For some, this means
the whole five years; others were upgraded to CA III during that time.
Local
1549 President Eddie Rodriguez applauded the members who stood strong together:
Were proud of them for not giving up, he said. It took
a lot of endurance, said Renee Gainer, assistant director ofDC 37s
Clerical Division.
Bryan Griffin, chief shop steward at Jacobi, underscored
the message: Patience, persistence and the union will get you what you need,
he said.
When we fight, we win! said Division Director Ronnie
Harris.
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