‘Enough is enough.’ Workers at The Meadows Psychiatric Center launch effort to unionize
Workers at the largest psychiatric hospital in Centre County rallied for a union Wednesday, part of an effort that two lead organizers described as a last-ditch attempt to address long-standing issues.
Former registered nurse supervisors Tami Kraynak and Dawn Taylor are spearheading the effort to band together more than 120 employees at The Meadows Psychiatric Center. Despite being fired in March, the pair deliberately used “We” instead of opting for any other pronoun.
“Until you’ve worked in an environment like that, we really do experience the same traumas day in and day out. It’s such a high-stress environment that we become really bonded, really quickly,” Kraynak said in March. “I’ve never seen anything like it until I worked there. You do almost become super protective of each other and supportive. It’s neat. We love our jobs. We just want it to be organized and safe.”
The two were hired some four years apart — Kraynak in 2013, Taylor in 2017 — but said they were fired the same day, in part, because of their efforts to unionize.
Leading unionization efforts was in “direct conflict with the conduct expected from employees who are supervisors and are in a leadership position,” The Meadows wrote in Kraynak’s termination letter. She said her work was not administrative.
More than four dozen people joined the pair Wednesday for a rally at the facility. The group included workers, state Rep. Scott Conklin, D-Rush Township, and Centre County Controller Jason Moser.
“I’m not walking away from this. I could get another nursing job tomorrow,” Taylor said in March. “It’s for my coworkers, for my patients and for the community. Our community are our patients and they have to come in there and see the conditions; it’s just deplorable.”
The group and the private 119-bed facility were separated only by state Route 45. Signs that read “Heroes wanted. Join our team” served as bookends to the entrance. Another read “Tell the union to buzz off.”
The company, which is one of the larger employers in Centre County, pledged to bargain in good faith if the majority of employees properly vote in favor of unionization, CEO Robin Weagley wrote in an email Wednesday.
“We are currently union free, and we value our ability to work directly with our employees on an individual basis to provide the best possible care to our patients without the insertion of an outside third party with interests that can often differ from those of our employees,” Weagley wrote. “... We also recognize our responsibility to provide employees with the facts surrounding unionization, so that employees can make an informed choice regarding this important issue.”
Some of the issues at the company — hiring and retaining employees, support from the business’ executives and administration, safety and training — have long existed and only worsened since the the onset of the pandemic, Kraynak and Taylor said.
Some employees have even purchased clothing or hygiene products for patients. “Enough is enough,” Taylor said.
“I hear the complaints and the issues and I’ve seen so many really good employees leave because of the different issues that we have as far as people getting hurt at work or safety issues,” Kraynak said in March. “... It’s like, at this point, what can we do to be heard? That’s when I talked to Dawn and I said, ‘You know what, this might be our best option if we band together. Maybe they’ll have to hear our voice.’ “
There’s been no shortage of social services workers who have asked about unionizing in the past two years, Local 668 of the Service Employees International Union President Stephen Catanese said.
More and more was asked of those workers without care for their well-being, he said.
“Especially at a place like The Meadows, where profit comes in front of patients, the message that we’ve really gotten from all these workers in various roles at The Meadows is not just, ‘We want respected and protected on the job, but we also want to make sure that our employer actually cares about the mission and people we’re serving,’ ” Catanese said Tuesday. “... They’re hiring nurses everywhere across the commonwealth right now. They could go find another job, but right now what’s more important to them is seeing this through because the lives that they touched and the lives that they cared for deserve better.”
This story was originally published April 6, 2022 at 5:12 PM.