Northwell's Huntington Hospital nurses vote to change union representation to NYSNA

Nurses at Northwell Health’s Huntington Hospital have voted to join the New York State Nurses Association after previously being represented by a different in-house union, organizers said.

The hospital’s 677 nurses will now be represented by NYSNA, which bills itself as the largest union of nurses in the state representing 42,000 members across New York. The Huntington nurses join over 3,600 members across six Northwell facilities already represented by the union.

“We are thrilled with the election results,” said Patricia Dowling, a lead organizer behind the campaign and a registered nurse who’s worked at Huntington Hospital for 21 years. “We had a lot of nurses supporting us.”

Dowling said the previous in-house union at the 348-bed hospital, the Huntington Hospital Nurses’ Association — an affiliate of the AFT Nurses and Health Professionals — “wasn’t able to contend with such a corporation” as Northwell.

“It’s like David and Goliath,” said Liliana Perez, another organizer and 19-year veteran nurse at the hospital. “We knew we needed the backing of a big union.”

The Wednesday election, overseen by the National Labor Relations Board, was to determine whether nurses would choose NYSNA or remain with the Huntington Hospital Nurses’ Association. The AFT-affiliated union has seven days to challenge the results with the NLRB.

Officials with the Huntington association could not immediately be reached for comment.

A “supermajority” of the hospital’s nursing staff signed a petition earlier this year seeking the statewide union’s representation, the NYSNA said in a news release announcing the election results. Nurses then signed a petition to the National Labor Relations Board in June asking for a vote on whether to join NYSNA or remain with its previous union.

“Huntington Hospital thanks our registered nurses (RNs) who participated in the representation election. The ballots were counted, and as a result of the election, our RNs voted to be represented by the New York State Nurses Association,” Northwell said in a statement issued Thursday evening.

Officials with NYSNA welcomed its new members with promises to deliver during contract negotiations.

“We are so excited to be welcoming our newest members to the union,” NYSNA President Nancy Hagans said in a statement released Thursday.