After recent negotiations by Mental Health Center of Denver and the employee union SEIU 105 reached a stalemate, the union members held a vote on the proposed contract of the management team. By a 94 percent against vote the management was told in clear terms what its employees thought of the proposal.
A few days later Mental Health Center of Denver implemented their proposal anyway.
Some anti-union types may celebrate this as a victory but they had better watch out for what they wish for.
One of the key issues in the contract was management’s demand to deny all benefits to any newly hired employees working less than thirty hours. This would include healthcare benefits.
The SEIU 105 represents registered nurses, psychiatric case-managers and therapists working with the persistently mentally ill clients of the City and County of Denver.
The clients of these professional workers are the unheard of and unknown last bastion of oppressed peoples. They are struggling to maintain a glimmer of hope for some normalcy while hearing the voices of schizophrenia. They are struggling to find security while having intrusive suicidal thoughts of major depression. They are struggling to have peace of mind while their minds race in a manic phase of bipolar illness. They look to their nurses, case-managers and therapists for comfort and guidance while having panic attacks of an anxiety disorder.
The mentally ill in our society are the forgotten oppressed people. A large proportion of America looks upon a person with a major mental illness as slackers or a drain. They stigmatize men, women and children who have physical illnesses of the brain causing horrible and terrifying results in hallucinations, constant depression, mania and anxiety.
The advocates for these men, women and children are the members of SEIU 105. The nurses, case-managers and therapists are the front lines of mental health. They are the men and women who have direct contact with the oppressed men, women and children with major mental illnesses.
Many may think the employees of a mental health center make great money. They’re wrong. Most of the men and women of the Mental Health Center of Denver have upper degrees in human services and get paid less than a grocery clerk or a transit driver. Many have to depend on a spouse or another job to have an income to pay back loans for college and have places to live.
During negotiations the Mental Health Center of Denver management suggested to the union employees they should compare their wages and benefits to employees of Wal-Mart. Even a state legislator chastised the management for such a comparison. The management never apologized to its employees.
The Mental Health Center of Denver has long advocated for citizens who lacked insurance but failed to meet guidelines for government assistance. They’re called the medically indigent. This group of people has grown to almost 40 percent of the American people.
Mental Health Center of Denver was morally correct to advocate for the medically indigent because all people deserve treatment for medical conditions.
Now under the new conditions of the management for part-time employees, Mental Health Center of Denver has created new medically indigent citizens. Part-time employment at mental health centers is a norm of long standing. It’s just always been a norm to provide these employees coverage of health benefits at some level until this time.
The Mental Health Center of Denver teaches citizens about the need for taking care of their stress and good mental hygiene. They talk to the community about mental health issues to make the mentally ill accepted by society. They talk with pride about the dedicated nurses, case-managers and therapists.
When the center was far less busy and there was far less stress, management agreed there should be two “mental health days” each year for employees in addition to vacation days and sick days. They took a progressive step of recognizing mental health was as important as physical health.
Now when the milieu has become more stressful and increasingly busier the center management has taken away all accrued sick days and lumped them into a modified PTO system. The end result is employees work harder under greater stress with less time off available.
It must be remembered the Mental Health Center of Denver is run by psychiatrists. These are MD specialists in psychiatric care. It baffles the mind medical doctors with a specialty in mental health could in good faith offer their employees such choices in their employment.
It is like the psychiatric care concept of management has been suspended to provide an unethical choice to the employees of the Mental Health Center of Denver.
Ethics and standards seem to only matter to management when the employee is expected to uphold them. There’s a double standard when management is to be held accountable.
At one time in the recent past the Mental Health Center of Denver was named the Mental Health Corporation of Denver. The name was changed to focus more on clinical care. Now it seems, like Wal-Mart, it should go back to the corporation name.
Terry Leichner, RN
Psychiatric Nurse with 22 years experience with the persistently mentally ill
Former RN Supervisor at Mental Health Corporation of Denver
Former union pipe-fitter and union company owner
Former union RN at Kaiser for SEIU 105
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