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     Current Issue Highlights Highlights Archive             Get to know your Business Agent today!  Find out how the union makes a difference on the job. |
Newsline: September 2000 UNION FILES LAWSUIT FOR HOSPITAL POLICE Condemning the city's efforts as "vindictive," Local 237 President Carl Haynes ordered union attorneys last month to file a lawsuit in Federal Court to prevent Mayor Giuliani and Health and Hospitals Corporation President Luis Marcos from continuing their attempt to privatize security at municipal medical centers. At a press conference following the filing of the suit August 16 by Attorney James L. Linsey in the U.S. District Court at 500 Pearl Street in lower Manhattan, Local 237 Secretary-Treasurer Nick Mancuso charged the city's privatization efforts were "retaliation, pure and simple." The union official asserted that the plan to provide security at the city hospitals with poorly paid employees of private firms "endangers the lives not only of the officers, but also the lives of the medical and administrative staffs, patients and visitors." He called for Marcos's immediate resignation for being so willing to jeopardize the lives of so many residents of the city. The suit, a class action which covers some 850 Hospital Police Officers currently employed in city facilities, seeks relief from "the unlawful threats and actions"' of Giuliani and Marcos, "to punish, sanction, and otherwise retaliate against them." The city's actions were initiated after the HPOs exercised their Constitutional rights to petition their government for legislation to provide necessary equipment for the protection of persons and property. The suit calls for a court order that will prevent the contracting out of hospital security, and protect the officers from any form of punishment, retaliation or sanctions from the city or HHC officials. The plan to turn security over to private employees was begun, Mancuso said, only after the union had sought the aid of state legislators in getting approval for Hospital Police Officers to carry firearms. "By telling us that they would privatize hospital police jobs if we got approval from the State legislature to get firearms for our members, the Giuliani Administration and HHC not only are blatantly violating the Constitutional rights of our members, they are trying to intimidate us," Mancuso charged. "It's the standard bully tactic that the Giuliani Administration has been using over the last eight years. They are saying `either you do as we say or we will get rid of you,' " he insisted. Mancuso distributed a press release issued by HHC December 21, which noted the union's efforts to obtain legislation to permit HPOs to carry firearms. The HHC said: "If passed, this legislation would compel HHC to contract out security services with private companies that will do the job without the need of firearms." The union's lawsuit noted that although New York City Hospital Police are denied the right to carry firearms for protection, hospital police across the country -- including all Veteran Administration Hospitals nationwide and major hospitals in Atlanta, Chicago, Boston, San Francisco and Birmingham -- all are permitted to bear weapons. "What the city and HHC are doing is dangerous," Mancuso asserted. "Private security guards are paid minimum wage and are poorly trained. The patients, visitors and employees in city hospitals should be alarmed by HHC's actions to hand over their safety to a private security firm." The union official contended that doctors and nurses at city hospitals "are already fearful of being unnecessarily exposed to all kinds of elements because HHC will no longer have control over the people they hire to provide security." Mancuso pointed out that HPOs have status as "peace officers" and are capable of making arrests on the spot when incidents occur. "Private firms give their employees only slightly more than the minimum wage and tell them to avoid anything that may be controversial," he said. |
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