As we await final passage of the nurse/technologist staffing bill, I want to thank you for all your advocacy. We know the bill will be challenging to operationalize. However, we are in better shape than we would have been if we had not actively engaged. Thank you for the time you spent going to Olympia, calling your legislators, sending in messages and working with our staff to make the bill better. The results show that it was time well spent.
The bill is much, much better than the original bill the unions have been pursuing for a decade. Read our full summary of the bill here. We secured numerous important provisions that balance patient needs with addressing employee fatigue. The bill gives our members flexibility to meet the needs of patients in several key areas. The eight-hour shift limit is removed. Unfortunately, in the final bill, the exceptions we secured in the King amendment for Critical Access Hospitals and technicians/technologists were weakened.
WSHA will work to support hospitals during implementation. We are working on a plan and will provide significant help before January 1, 2020 when most hospitals implement significant portions of this bill. We look forward to your help in determining what would be most useful.
Best regards,
| Cassie Sauer WSHA President & CEO cassies@wsha.org |
Chelene Whiteaker WSHA Senior Vice President, Government Affairs chelenew@wsha.org |
