Medic Kevorkian
Forum Ride Along
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Looking for any info (good or bad) on NEMSA. Is anyone a member? If so, how do you like them? Have they done what they promised?
There have also been lots of people dissatisfied with NEMSA, and NEMSA ditched the Portland AMR EMT's without any notice.
The local private ambulance that provides our ALS support is currently negotiating their first contract with NEMSA. I'll let you know if I hear anything either way. So far both the employees and management are pretty content with the process.
Unfortunatley, this will also protect the slackers and people who shouldn't be in the field, but, y'know, I suppose it's a two way street.
My company was recently unionized through NEMSA and I am a union steward.
I've had a lot of very good interactions with my rep who was a paramedic in the area for many years. We're currently working through our first grievance and it's going well, I've had good communication throughout. The rep has been more than willing to hold my hand through the process, which I very much appreciate.
I have heard, however, from several people down here that NEMSA is "next to powerless." However, this is purely anecdotal, I've heard no cases to back it up, then again I haven't really looked into it too much.
I'm generally not a fan of unions, but we needed some sort of protection, it seemed that here showing up and doing one's job well just wasn't enough. Unfortunatley, this will also protect the slackers and people who shouldn't be in the field, but, y'know, I suppose it's a two way street.
Not if the company is doing things correctly to weed out these individuals. A union is there to provide collective bargaining rights, and to enforce the details of the contract. If the company fails to adhere to the contract by terminating an employee without following the appropriate procedures, and the union enforces this, it may be conceived as defending bad behavior. However, if the company had acted in accordance with the contract, this wouldn't be an issue.
As a union steward you are obliged to defend an employee. If the employee screws up, and the company has appropriate documentation, then they must follow the progressive discipline set forth in the collective bargaining agreement. If that doesn't weed out the slackers, then the company isn't following the necessary appropriate documentation procedures for doing so.
As an additional note, we did go with NEMSA after this initial thread was written. The concept of an all EMS union is good, however with a poor national leadership with questionable integrity, things have not been what had been promised. I know there are changes on the horizon, I only hope that this change comes to fruition before the membership becomes so disenchanted that they either change unions again, or de-certify completely. That would be a tragic loss of what has been gained from the previous years.