United Nurses and Allied Professionals

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The United Nurses and Allied Professionals (UNAP) is a labor union in the United States which represents 4,500 registered nurses and other health care workers in the public and private sector working in New England.The organization was formed in 1998 when 3,500 health care workers belonging to the health care division of the American Federation of Teachers, AFL-CIO, disaffiliated from that union in a dispute over how much money should be spent on organizing new members. The workers, at the time all located in the state of Rhode Island, demanded higher spending on organizing in health care, which neither the AFT's state federation (the Rhode Island Federation of Teachers and Health Professionals RIFTHP) nor the national AFT was willing to do at the time. Most of RIFTHP's health care members (representing about 40 percent of RIFTHP's entire membership) disaffiliated in elections held in July and August of 1998. Although the AFT disputed the election results and sued former staff who went to work for UNAP, the AFT lost these challenges.UNAP is governed by its members, who meet annually. The members elect a president, executive vice president, two vice presidents, secretary, treasurer and 12-member board. Lynn Blais, a nurse at Fatima Hospital, was the organization's first president. In 2001, Blais stepped down and Linda McDonald, an RN at Rhode Island Hospital, was elected president. (Blais was elected one of two vice presidents.)The union is very active in Rhode Island politics, and offers a wide variety of professional development offers to its members. Nationally, UNAP has at times worked closely with the California Nurses Association, the Massachusetts Nurses Association, and the Service Employees International Union. However, it remains firmly independent.

Raiding

UNAP engaged in some raiding of AFT locals, particularly in the first two years after it became independent. In late 1998, UNAP raided two chapters of an existing RIFTHP visiting nurse local. In 1999, UNAP raided an AFT local at Brattleboro Retreat, a pyschiatric facility in Brattleboro, Vermont. UNAP again raided the AFT in 2001, this time winning the disaffiliation of a unit of registered nurses at Copley Hospital in Vermont.Raiding largely ceased after the AFT improved its collective bargaining and contract servicing in Vermont, and the AFT established a large local at Fletcher Allen Health Care—Vermont's largest hospital.

New organizing

UNAP has also been successful in organizing new members. In 1999, UNAP organized a small group of public school nurses in Putnam, Connecticut. In 2004, UNAP organized public sector county social and case workers in Youth Services, and in 2005 it organized clinicians at Health Care and Rehabilitative Services—both in Brattleboro. In January 2006, the union won an election for employees working in the adult services at the Homestead Group (formerly the Association for Retarded Citizens of Northern Rhode Island).

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