Dear Santa Clara County Resident,

We are the Registered Nurses Professional Association (RNPA) – the 3,500 nurses who dedicate our lives to serving all of you. We work within the Santa Clara Health and Hospital System, which includes Valley Medical Center (VMC), O’Connor Hospital (OCH), Saint Louise Regional Hospital (SLRH), Custody Health, and outpatient clinics across the County.

We are currently in contract negotiations with Santa Clara County and unfortunately it has not progressed as we had hoped. We have asked for reasonable things like better safeguards to protect nurses against violence, and better staffing to promote quality patient care. Nurses should not be subjected to daily physical and verbal abuse from patients. Understaffing and violent patients endangers not only the nurse but also other patients and their families. It is not an environment that promotes health and healing. Because our wages are below market, and we are losing our best trained nurses to other hospitals, we are advocating for the county to pay competitive wages.   Millions of tax payer dollars are being wasted on hiring and training nurses who end up getting recruited by neighboring hospitals for higher pay.

The 5^th year anniversary of the County’s purchase of OCH and SLRH is fast approaching, and the County has yet to standardize best-practices across the whole health system. The County has failed to make investments in basic resources to keep nurses, patients, visitors, and other healthcare workers safe. They have ignored unsafe staffing ratios which lead to dangerous conditions for patients and nurses and are attempting to force inappropriate patients into specialized units. These unsafe practices go against their aim to serve our community as its safety net.

Santa Clara County residents and nurses should not have to pay for the County’s failed integration. Please help us get the Board of Supervisors’ attention and ask them to do what’s right for the nurses and our community. Take a moment to fill out this petition and help us advocate for better conditions for patients and nurses. Once you fill out this petition, it will be simultaneously sent to the 5 Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors (Sylvia Arenas, Cindy Chavez, Otto Lee, Susan Ellenberg & Joe Simitian), James Williams – Santa Clara County Executive and Paul Lorenz – CEO of the Santa Clara Health and Hospital System.

Thank You for your time and consideration.

With sincere gratitude,

Santa Clara County Registered Nurses