UCI Medical Center, Nurses Reach 3-Year Contract Agreement

ORANGE — A labor dispute between UCI Medical Center and its nurses was settled early Saturday when negotiators reached a tentative agreement on a three-year contract, UCI spokeswoman Elaine Beno announced.

The California Nurses Assn. is expected to vote within the next two or three weeks on whether to ratify the pact, which calls for a 3% salary increase retroactive to Nov. 1, and another 3% next May. Pay raises for the second year of the contract may be negotiated next fall, Beno said.

The agreement ends several weeks of discord.

Frustrated that an agreement would not be reached before the Oct. 31 expiration date of the last contract, nurses staged a one-day sick-out the day before the deadline.

That protest effectively shut the hospital trauma center for about 12 hours and delayed some non-emergency surgeries. The action was not sanctioned by the nurses association, hospital administrators said.

The labor group had been asking for a 12.5% pay raise, and at one time, the university offered 7%.

In what Beno called “substantial gains for UCI nurses,” the agreement calls for the 6% pay raise plus the 5% merit increases that “virtually all nurses are eligible for annually.”

Additional pay for certification in specific specialty areas will also be available.

Beno said the basic pay hike means that the average pay for a full-time nurse at UCI Medical Center would be $37,440 per year.