photo credit: Noah Abrams/KRCB

Healthcare workers at Kaiser facilities across the country walked out Wednesday in a historic strike.

The hot sun couldn’t scare away dozens of Kaiser employees from manning the picket lines out front of the Kaiser Santa Rosa Medical Center.

Those chanting and marching at the corner of Mendocino and Bicentennial Avenue’s joined with thousands of other Kaiser employees with the SEIU-UHW union striking across the state.

Starlene Holguin, a longtime employee at Kaiser in Santa Rosa and union steward, said the message from the union is straightforward.

"So we are front line healthcare workers," Holguin said. "We want Kaiser executives to bargain in good faith."

And there is one driving force for this current strike, Holguin said.

"We're bargaining over the short staffing crisis, and we're hoping that Kaiser executives see eye to eye with us," Holguin said.

Holguin said there’s a wide variety of workers taking part in the strike as well.

"It's anywhere from respiratory therapists, LVN's, medical assistants, ED techs, our EVS, which is the housekeeping department, Rad techs, ultrasound techs," Holguin said. "So we're considered the service union."

Even in the afternoon heat, spirits were high, including Jeannie Gerbich’s.

"This is the best day ever," Gerbich said.

An ultrasound tech with Kaiser for 13 years, Gerbich said the strike isn’t only for the workers.

"This is glorious because what this shows is unity with our SEIU staff," Gerbich said. "And I'll tell you what, none of us wanted it to get to this, but yet here we are and all we ask is that Kaiser bargain in good faith. And you know, really, you hear all these horns, all these people honking, this is our community. They want us to have proper staffing because they're our patients."

SEIU leaders have called for a three day strike, Wednesday to Friday, and according to Holguin, the union and Kaiser management continue to meet at the bargaining table.

In a written statement a Kaiser spokesperson said they "remain committed to reaching a new agreement;" have met their "goal of hiring 10,000 new Coalition-represented employees by year-end;" and that "all our hospitals and emergency departments remain open."