Nurse Alliance end of the year report
End of Year Report
From Ingela Dahlgren, Executive Director, Nurse Alliance of California
The Nurse Alliance of California is reaching the end of a very exciting and enormously successful year. As you all know, I was asked to lead the Nurse Alliance in February 2009. I accepted the Interim Executive Director position and with the help from Kathy Hughes, RN, 121RN Liaison set out on the adventure to reenergize and unite all our strong and brilliant RNs here in California.
The Steering Committee formed a hiring committee to conduct the search for the full-time director and asked if I would consider accepting the position as Director, which I was thrilled to say yes. The Steering Committee agreed we should have a democratic election for the Executive Director position and in June 2009 I was voted to lead our organization. It is a gigantic undertaking to lead the organization and the support from all of you has been vital to the success.
We started off by reenergizing and encouraging the hard working steering committee members to participate in the monthly meetings. With all the critical issues going on in our state we decided we needed to hold monthly meetings. We alternate every other month between a face to face meeting and Video/conference call meeting. We are still working out the kinks with the technical aspects but the video meeting is getting more and more productive. It saves us from getting on the road and spending time and gas. It’s our way of going green!
Annual Legislative Conference:
In the month of May, we put together our annual Legislative Conference. It was nerve racking and exciting. We had a month to prepare for what normally takes at least six months to plan. Everybody helped and the 75 nurse members that attended were engaged in plenary sessions, workshops and a lobby day. We received very positive evaluations and feedback from the experience.
During the legislative conference, we conducted a survey to see how prepared the different facilities’ where in regards to Airborne Transmissible Disease .This survey laid the ground work in our involvement with the H1N1 standards.
Ongoing Program Work:
Health and Safety: Almost immediately following the conference, we got an “emergency call” from Mark Catlin SEIU Industrial Hygienist to participate in a Cal OSHA hearing in San Diego. This was the CALOSHA board’s final hearing before passage of the landmark standard for Airborne Transmissible Disease (ATD). It was the first time they had ever had standing ovation at the CALOSHA hearing! Following passage of the new standard, we took our show on the road to educate nurses and healthcare workers about their rights to strong protection. Our first stop on the train the trainer ATD class was Local 1021 where we had 20 RN’s sign up and 20 showed up! BJ Wilson was out training her colleagues the next day.
Over 35 RNs attended the class at Local 721 and classes are now being held all over LA County.
Kathy Hughes, Local 121RN, was asked to sit on a panel at UCLA and gave a 30 minute expert class.
Healthcare Reform:
The Nurse Alliance of California is heavily involved in the most important issue in our life time as nurses. We started this during the Legislative conference with speakers like Dylan Roby, PhD Adjunct Assistant Professor UCLA School of Public Health and Ellen Marie Whelan, RN, Associate Director of Health Policy and Senior Health Policy Analyst, Center for American Progress. We did a train the trainer class on that subject in Florida and then got to go and visit local 521to present the class. All our members participated in the June lobbying in Washington D.C. Back home we attended town hall meetings to convince our elected officials’ to listen to the nurses who votes for them.
Mary Bono down in Palm Springs got visit from our nurses. We continue to participate and are always available when it comes to speaking out for healthcare reform.
BRN:
Our dear Governor meanwhile decided to dismantle our BRN board .We sprung into action and started to attend all the board meetings. The Nurse Alliance reached out to UNAC, CNA and ANA and now we are actually working together to stop some of the outrageous changes that the new board appointed by the governor is trying to get away with. When asked to testify at Senator Gloria McLeod hearing for SR 25 I spoke together with the all the other nurse organizations.
Communication:
So how are we getting all this information out to all our members? With the expert help of Andy Hagelshaw communicator extra ordinary we overhauled the Nurse Alliance of CA Website. We added a “get active” alert that proved to be very successful when Dr Mark Horton Director of California Department of Public Health decided to down grade ATD to droplet precaution only. Our nurses roared to the tune of 240 emails in one day. Dr. Horton changed his mind.
Andy has been instrumental in getting our newsletters produced and looking professional. We are currently on our second newsletter and we are hearing back from nurses that we have never heard from before. We having a new brochure in the works that Andy is putting together. So stay tuned for that edition.
Budget:
We have set out to activate, inspire and unite all the RNs within SEIU Nurses Alliance and are excited about or achievements over the past 8 months. To continue our work in 2010, the Budget Committee is making the following recommendations:
1. With stability of the Nurse Alliance of CA program and a permanent direction to move the funds from SEIU headquarters back to CA to allow the Executive Director direct and timely access to the Nurse Alliance of CA budget, as well as monitoring and reporting on spending to the Steering Committee.
2. Because the Executive Director is based out of Local 121RN, the budget committee is recommending that the account be “housed” at Local 121RN in a separate account that would segregate the funds.
3. Assess incoming funds to ensure that all CA locals that represent nurses are meeting their obligation of the $1.45 per RN per month cap.
4. To start the year 2010 off on the right foot we would like to schedule a conference call with all the locals’ leadership participating; (Presidents/Executive Directors).
5. The agenda would include a discussion and acceptance of the steering committee budget proposal.
We from the Nurse Alliance of California wish you the best of holidays and a very Happy New Year
Sincerely yours,
Ingela Dahlgren, RN
Director Nurse Alliance of California