Nurses at two hospital systems are voting on tentative agreements after the longest and largest nurses’ strike in New York City history. 15,000 nurses went on strike for four weeks to fight for safe staffing, protections against workplace violence, and to defend their own healthcare benefits.

The hospitals tried to roll back gains that nurses won in a strike three years ago, including contract language that required the hospitals to pay financial penalties for violating safe staffing.

Nurses held down picket lines in sub-zero temperatures. Teamsters, other unions, political leaders, and the public joined them on picket lines. 

Now, 10,500 New York State Nurses Association (NYSNA) members at Mount Sinai and Montefiore are voting on tentative agreements that defeated management givebacks to maintain safe staffing language, protect their health benefits, and increase salaries by 12 percent. 

Around 4,200 nurses at New York-Presbyterian have not reached an agreement. The sticking point: safe staffing ratios. 

The CEOs of Montefiore, Mount Sinai, and New York-Presbyterian make a combined $48.4 million a year. These hospitals can afford safe patient care.