(THREE RIVERS) – Nurses At Three Rivers Health-Beacon Health Systems will be letting the community know about their steps to get a fair contract.

The nurses are holding a rally and informational picket on Tuesday, May 17. Their contract expired on March 31 and some of the sticking points in the negotiations include the Hospital’s excessive forced overtime and efforts to cut related compensation. The nurses say they are routinely forced to stay past their shifts and are often called in on their days off.

Brandy Shoup, an Emergency Department nurse and President of the local union says nurses just keep giving everything they have, and all the Hospital does is demand more and more. She says Beacon Health has come in and shown that it would rather take advantage of its nurses than invest in what the community needs. Shoup says they need to be able to recruit and keep nurses – not keep driving them away by exhausting them and disrupting their lives with 16 hour days and canceled PTO.

Beacon Health has also threatened the nurses with layoffs, despite spending $232 million on a new tower at a hospital in South Bend, Indiana

Approximately 75 nurses work at Three Rivers Health-Beacon Health System. Shoup says this is not a strike. Nurses who will be participating are off-shift, and patient care will not be affected.

The picket will be from 4:30 PM to 6 PM on May 17. Speakers will start at 5 PM and will be in the parking lot at 1147 West Broadway Street. Community members are invited to participate in the picket to show their support for the Three Rivers nurses.