Brave, Impoverished Caregivers Defeat Vicious Anti-Union Campaign To Vote For 1199SEIU

Medical Resources employees become the first private home care agency employees to form a union in Massachusetts as part of the growing Fight for $15 movement. Attorneys David Rome, Patrick Bryant, and Ian Russell provided advice during the organizing and election campaigns.

The successful Union Yes! vote is part of a wave of momentum for 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East and the Fight for $15, following last week’s historic agreement between the state’s 35,000 Personal Care Attendants represented by 1199SEIU and Governor Charlie Baker. The agreement ensures a pathway to a starting wage of $15 per hour.

Medical Resource Home Health Corp. receives $22 per client hour in Massachusetts taxpayer funding. Medical Resources is owned by Angelo, Gordon, Co., one of the largest and wealthiest private equity firms in the nation.

Right now, nearly all 236 caregivers at Medical Resources are eligible for food stamps, subsidized housing, or subsidized health insurance. The workforce is comprised almost entirely of minority women, many of whom care for elderly clients in Boston’s historic Chinatown neighborhood. As the newest members of 1199SEIU United Health Care Workers East, the state’s fastest-growing union, those workers will now be able to collectively bargain for pay increases and meaningful benefits.

Veronica Turner, 1199SEIU Executive Vice President, remarked, “The idea that one of the nation’s wealthiest private equity firms would be spending so many patient care dollars trying to intimidate, harass, and suppress the rights of these caregivers is reprehensible. We will be calling on all of our community and elected allies to continue standing with these caregivers so we can ensure that today marks the end of the wasteful, oppressive anti-union campaign waged by executives from Medical Resources and Angelo, Gordon.”

The Chinese Progressive Association supported the organizing drive.