skip to main content

Committee on Political Education (COPE)

Our Voice for Safe Patient Care and Working Conditions

HPAE union members are fighting to improve standards in their workplace. Some of the changes we need to make as a union go beyond the walls of our employers and require changes in the law. This includes strong oversight from regulatory agencies, such as the New Jersey Department of Health.

Just like in collective bargaining, it takes active and involved members to lobby our state and federal policymakers for access to safe and affordable healthcare, adequate funding for medical research, and workplace rights.

That’s why HPAE members – through COPE – are continually in the forefront of public efforts to fix our healthcare system. No one knows better than our members the problems in our healthcare system – or the ways our society needs to have healthcare corporations prioritize patients, not profits.

HPAE's Priorities

HPAE has won important changes in laws and regulations. Here are a few:

  • Violence Prevention Programs
  • Emergency Preparedness Plans
  • Pay Equity
  • Ban on Mandatory Overtime
  • Earned sick days
  • Nursing Home CNA to Patient Staffing Ratios
  • Unemployment Insurance for Striking Workers
  • Medical Debt Relief
  • Union Rights for Public Sector Workers

“Winning improvements in our workplaces is a priority for us as a union of healthcare professionals. Our voices collectively have resulted in contracts that go further to protect our rights and laws that have set standards across the state. From these are just a small example of how HPAE members have helped to make improvements for all healthcare workers.”
– Faith Mazuru, RN, President, HPAE Local 5091 at Bergen NewBridge Medical Center

Safe Staffing Saves Lives

Pass The Patient Protection and Safe Staffing Act