Shana Weisgerber

South Jersey Healthcare Vineland, N.J. Health Professionals and Allied Employees-AFT (HPAE-AFT)

Shana Weisgerber

Shana Weisgerber has been a nurse for 10 years and has worked in the South Jersey Healthcare (SJH) in Vineland, N.J., for 19 years. She works in the surgical intensive care unit, caring for patients after surgery.

A couple of years ago, Weisgerber’s hospital underwent several structural changes, consolidating three facilities and closing another. Weisgerber was troubled by the potential effects of these changes on patient care. She was also concerned that many of the decisions about nursing were not made by nurses—the restructuring at SJH was creating instability and uncertainty for both patients and nurses.

Weisgerber says, “We felt as though we needed to form a union to protect ourselves. We felt that every day, going into work, you never knew what you were going to be faced with. Management changed policies every day, and you had absolutely no protection whatsoever.”

Weisgerber and her co-workers decided to form a union with Health Professionals and Allied Employees-AFT (HPAE-AFT). 

But management fought back with a flood of anti-union meetings, fliers, mail and e-mail. The nurses were forced to sit through mandatory anti-union meetings where the workers were given misinformation about the union. Weisgerber says there was extreme intimidation from managers. 

“I was encouraged not to vote for the union,” says Weisgerber.

In fact, on one occasion in particular, Weisgerber’s manager followed her into a patient care room to interrogate her about her association with the union. Weisgerber filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board. Even though Weisgerber says that she felt "harassed," the only outcome of her complaint was a notice posted by the hospital saying they would not do that again.

Weisgerber and her co-workers stuck together, despite the hospital’s campaign of fear and misinformation, and won their election in July 2006. After appeals winded through the courts, Weisgerber and her co-workers finally got their union in February 2007.