Black-Clad Nurses Ask County for 4-Day Week : Protest: Mental health workers say they had been promised the change. Officials say technical problems are delaying action on it.

About 40 county mental health nurses dressed in black Monday to protest the county’s failure to implement a four-day workweek that nurses say was promised two years ago.

The nurses threatened to continue their protest Thursday by picketing the county Mental Health Center if county officials do not act promptly on past promises.

The nurses want their traditional workweek of five eight-hour days changed to four 10-hour days. Nurses on weekend shifts would work three 12-hour days.

The four-day week would allow the nurses, who work at a 24-hour clinic that admits mental patients, to take more training classes. It would also keep nurses with their patients longer, reducing stress for those being treated, said Glenda Strosnider, a spokeswoman for the nurses.

“We’ve never protested. We’ve never picketed. So this is all new to us,” she said.

The shorter workweek would also cut down on daily car trips by nurses, reducing traffic and smog, Strosnider said.

The protest by mental health nurses comes as county officials are addressing a wage demand and a high turnover rate among nurses at other county facilities, including Ventura County Medical Center.

The Board of Supervisors will today consider staff recommendations to increase by 5% the salaries of about 60 specially trained nurses whose positions are most difficult to fill.

Supervisor Susan Lacey met briefly Monday with a few mental health nurses at the Mental Health Center to assure them that county administrators support the four-day workweek.

“There is no question that everybody wants this,” she said. “It sounds simple, but it’s not always that simple to implement.”

Duane Essex, deputy director of the county Mental Health Services Department, said the change is being delayed by numerous technical questions such as when to begin paying overtime. The nurses’ contract calls for paid overtime for work after eight consecutive hours, which routinely would be exceeded on a four-day schedule.

Essex said he hopes that nurses and management can iron out the last remaining problems this week.

“There is not a person in the county who is opposed to this,” he said.

Anticipating a shorter workweek, the nurses have begun to increase their daily workload, Strosnider said. “We have been putting in 10 hours’ worth of work, and we are still only working eight-hour shifts,” she said.

Even worse, the Mental Health Center has been operating over capacity for the past few weeks, said Victoria Gonzales, a mental health nurse. The center is designed to house 28 patients but is accommodating 32, she said. “It’s almost unmanageable,” she said.

Meanwhile, the county’s wage dispute with other nurses is scheduled for discussion today by the Board of Supervisors.

The county has a vacancy rate of as high as 30% for highly trained nursing positions because it usually pays less than other local hospitals, according to county health officials.

The recommendations before the supervisors include a 5% pay increase for veteran public health nurses and nurse practitioners, the two positions that have been the most difficult to fill.

Though the recommendations are an outgrowth of a task force of nurses and managers, county officials and employee union representatives said the proposals do not go far enough to solve the problems.

Phillipp Wessels, the county’s health care director, said the proposed wage increases still would not provide parity between county nurses who work in clinics and county hospital nurses, who generally are paid more.

“If the intent of this action is to return all nurses’ salary to parity, then perhaps more review is needed,” he said.

Barry L. Hammitt, executive director of the Public Employees Assn. of Ventura County, said the recommendations do not respond to the nurses’ demand that they be allowed to help set wages and schedules at county health facilities.

“When push comes to shove, I don’t think they are going to be happy with the recommendations,” he said.

Personnel Director Ronald Komers, who drafted the recommendations, could not be reached Monday. However, in a report to the supervisors, he said it would cost about $2 million a year to increase all county health care salaries, including those for physicians and aides, to match salaries at private hospitals.