Hospital Interns and Residents Picket Over Contract Dispute

Residents and interns picketed Cambridge City Hospital yesterday to protest the City of Cambridge's refusal to negotiate a contract while both parties await a state ruling on alleged unfair labor practices.

Cambridge officials stopped negotiating April 9, when they filed a grievance with the Massachusetts Labor Relations Commission (MLRC) claiming the demands of the hospital employees infringed on "management rights," Robert Healy, assistant city manager, said yesterday. A hearing concerning the City's charges is scheduled for April 30.

Fill'em up

The doctors claim that they are only asking for the city to fill present vacancies so they will no longer be forced to perform duties usually handled by nurses and lab technicians. "They haven't taken us at all seriously," Dr. Daphne Blackburn, one of the picketers, said yesterday. "They've looked upon us as a group of students instead of physicians," she added.

Healy said the doctors' demands do not fall under the MLRC's definition of "working conditions." Only working conditions, salary, and fringe benefits are negotiable.

Leaflet

The city's action followed the distribution April 5 of an informational leaflet to other hospital employees by the Cambridge Hospital House Officers' Association (CHHOA). The leaflet urged other unions to support the CHHOA's staffing demands in the negotiations. In its grievance, the city charged CHHOA with "coercing" the other hospital staff, Healy said.

Blackburn charged the city was taking unfair advantage of the transient state of the doctors and interns by stalling contract negotiations.