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Oregon home-care workers file petition for representation by OPEU By BILL KETTLER Oregon home-care workers will seek union representation to earn better pay and benefits. Home-care workers filed a petition Tuesday to be represented by the Oregon Public Employees Union. OPEU represents thousands of public employees across the state, including nonfaculty workers at Southern Oregon University and some Jackson County employees. The election could bring an additional 13,000 members into the union statewide and hundreds in Jackson County. Ballots were mailed to home-care workers after the petition for union representation was filed, said Colleen Mercer, a Jackson County union organizer for OPEU. She said home-care workers would have about three weeks to return their ballots. Home-care workers provide assistance for elderly and disabled people. They earn $7 to $8 per hour on average as employees of the Oregon Department of Human Resources, but they do not have benefits such as health insurance or workers compensation, paid vacation or holidays. Home-care workers earned the right to seek union representation when voters approved Ballot Measure 99 in November 2000. The ballot measure also created an independent Home Care Commission to establish home-care worker qualifications. Creating a union will ultimately bring better care for people in need, said Medford care-giver Tammy Adams. She earns $8.22 an hour doing housework, cooking meals and attending to the personal hygiene needs of a 60-year-old woman who has multiple sclerosis. "People do this because they have a heart for this kind of work," Adams said, "but you have to make a living wage. Right now there's a huge turnover in home care because the wages aren't high and there's no benefits. You can go to Wal-Mart and get better benefits and pay." Adams said benefits such as workers' compensation are more important to home-care workers than higher wages. "If I were to get injured moving my client, I'd be out of work without pay." Adams said unionized home-care workers would still provide less-expensive care for seniors and disabled people than nursing homes, and give them quality of life advantages such as staying in their own homes. Adams said she expected home-care workers to vote overwhelmingly in favor of the union. "Who would oppose it?" she said. "I don't have a clue." Reach reporter Bill Kettler at 776-4492, or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.