Union workers at Our Lady of Angels Retirement Home protest planned closure
CHICAGO (CBS)-- Union workers gathered Monday morning in Joliet, in an effort to save Our Lady of Angels Retirement Home from closing.
The nursing home has 80 beds and more than 70 staff members, and has been in Joliet for 60 years.
Employees voted to unionize last summer and the Illinois Nurses Association said the union has been trying to negotiate a contract with the retirement home since October, but management has indicated the home will close next year.
A union leader said the timing is suspect.
"For them to tell us they have been thinking about doing this for a few years, but then not do it until the workers won their election and formed their union, and then you drop this bomb on them in the middle of contract negotiations, that sounds kind of retaliatory to me," said Illinois Nurses Association union organizer Jessica Prewitt,
The workers said they'll continue their fight.
Sister Jeanne Bessette, president of Sisters of Saint Francis of Mary Immaculate, which oversees Our Lady of Angels, said it was a "difficult decision to close this beloved facility."
"OLA can't operate as a stand-alone facility and continues to not meet operating costs every single month. The resident census is less than half of what it was when we announced closure. We are assisting every resident to find a new home, including holding fairs for other long term care facilities to come and help welcome residents. Additionally we are holding recruitment fairs for employees. The entire Joliet area long term care facilities are understaffed and hoping to hire employees once OLA closed its doors," she said in an email.
