SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) — Physicians at Rehoboth McKinley Christian hospital in Gallup have taken the first major step toward unionizing to pursue collective bargaining on employment provisions, hospital staff and a union official said Tuesday.
The majority of roughly 30 physicians at the hospital have signed and submitted union authorization cards to the National Labor Relations Board, said Sue Wilson, spokeswoman of the Union of American Physicians and Dentists. A vote on unionization could still be required by the hospital operator, she said.
The push to unionize follows both financial turmoil and harrowing encounters with COVID-19 at the hospital in the trading post city of Gallup on the edge of the Navajo Nation.