SEIU home-care workers agree to ‘historic’ contract

The Service Employees Union International Local 503, which represents 24,000 Oregon home-care workers, announced a tentative contract agreement with the state on Thursday. They called it historic.

The contract paves the way for a $15-an-hour wage for home-care workers by 2017, among other provisions.

“Our workers, personal support and home care, really need to have a living wage,” said Eileen Ordway, a home-care worker and member of the SEIU’s bargaining team.

“Without a living wage, we have to rely on public assistance programs to make ends meet. So, we’re like any other worker,” Ordway said. “We want to be able to sustain ourselves and our families.”

The $15 an hour wage will be reached through incremental pay increases.

Starting Jan. 1, wages will increase from $13.75 an hour to $14 an hour. On Feb. 1, 2017, wages will increase to $14.50 an hour.

Also in 2017 a training certification takes effect that could boost pay 50 cent per hour, meaning home-care workers can earn $15 an hour.

“The contract we won last night was awesome and it’ll go all over the nation,” said Phyllis Wills, a member of the SEIU 503 collective bargaining team. The team met with state negotiators into early morning hours for several weeks to reach an agreement on the contract.

The agreement also secures paid time off and implementation of new state retirement options.

“This is history for us. We’ve never had retirement security,” said Alice Redding, a home-care worker and bargaining team member. “And people who have been working for years, they just have Social Security. So this is a big plus for those that are still working and are younger.”

SEIU 503 bargaining team members hope this contract will become a model for home-care workers around the nation.

“It’s amazing. I was in tears when I was at the Capitol,” Redding said.

Home-care workers represented by SEIU Local 503 will have the chance to vote on the contract’s ratification soon.

‘A fight on their hands’

SEIU Local 503 was met with a class action suit earlier this month from the Freedom Foundation, a nonprofit think tank based in Washington state. The Freedom Foundation advocates against required union membership. They recently opened an office in Salem.

Ordway said the value of union membership isn’t in the dues, it’s the ability to influence the industry through one voice. “When we’re individuals we don’t have the kind of power that we do when we combine our voices.”

She said workers from states where litigation similar to the Freedom Foundation’s has succeeded described their labor system as “in shambles,” saying worker’s weren’t able to live on their wages and they lost their benefits.

The suit, filed in federal court, is pending.

“They’re going to have a fight on their hands,” Wills said.

gfriedman2@statesmanjournal.com, (503) 399-6653 or on Twitter @gordonrfriedman

The contract includes the following major provisions:

• Wage increases that lead the way towards $15 an hour
• Retirement benefits protections
• Protection of paid time off
• Paid travel time