The gloves are off between two unions battling for Northern California Kaiser Permanente Workers. On June 2 a relatively new union, formed by leaders who split from the massive Service Employees International Union-United Health Care workers (SEIU-UHW) announced that a majority of 1,300 Northern California Kaiser mental health professionals signed a petition for an election to switch to the National Union of Health Care Workers (NUHW). The National Labor Relations Board has yet to set the date of the election.

The open window to change unions is June 3 to July 3 and NUHW says there are more Kaiser workers to come. This month the union expects to recruit 380 Northern California Kaiser optical workers, 370 medical social workers and 44,000 service technology and clerical workers statewide, said a NUHW spokesperson.

The union has had some success in Southern California already. In January 950 registered nurses at Kaiser LAMC, 1,025 psychiatric social workers and 300 healthcare professionals voted to join NUHW.

SEIU, which claims to be the fastest growing union in the nation with 150,000 healthcare workers in California and 2.2 million members nationwide, has a lot to lose if NUHW is successful in attracting some of the larger SEIU units in Northern California. On May 28 SEIU-UHW members at Kaiser announced a tentative two-year labor agreement that would cover almost 48,000 members, half of the 96,000 union members in the 32 unions of the Coalition of Kaiser Permanente Unions. Those members include licensed vocational nurses, respiratory therapists, radiologic technologists and others.

“We negotiated a great contract given that this is the worst economy since the Great Depression,” said Therese Fleming, a contract specialist for her SEIU bargaining unit and a psychologist in Folsom.

The proposed agreement includes a 3 percent wage increase each year for three years starting in October of this year, protection of existing benefits, and job security protections such as an employment and income security agreement with one-year minimum pay if a position is eliminated.

That agreement goes to the Union Delegates Conference on June 12 and the Kaiser Permanente Program Group and the Kaiser Permanente Board of Directors after that. If that all goes well, the agreement goes to individual union members this summer for ratification.

“We have the strength of all these other unions bargaining with Kaiser,” Fleming said. “They’re (NUHW) not going to be able to do anything. I’m very concerned that other people are considering it,” she said.

NUHW representatives have a very different view of the proposed labor agreement.

“SEIU took away our voice in our workplace, and settled a contract that has the lowest wage increases in 15 years, puts our health insurance at risk, and takes way our strength to negotiate locally for the improvements we need, like better staffing levels…” said Emily Ryan, a member of NUHW’s Interim Executive Board and a psychiatric social worker at Kaiser Sacramento in a prepared statement.

A former executive of SEIU has led the formation of NUHW so some SEIU members who are considering switching to NUHW consider their move a “taking back” of their union.

“IBHS (Integrated Behavioral Health Services) professionals are very excited to be the first to petition for an election to join NUHW this year. Mental Health professionals in Southern California already joined NUHW, and when we join, we’ll all be in the same union again and have more strength to work together on our professional practice issues to make sure Kaiser members get the best care possible,” Ryan said.

Fleming said there have been claims that SEIU is not member-driven but rather corporate-driven now.

“But we’re much more democratic now,” she said. “We just rewrote our bylaws to include a 130- member elected executive board.”