Inter-Con security guards strike at Kaiser facilities

Security officers walked off the job at 16 Kaiser Permanente facilities in Northern California Tuesday -- including Kaiser's South Sacramento Medical Center on Bruceville Road -- in a three-day strike to raise support for their longtime efforts to unionize.

Replacements were on duty at the local hospital and patient care was not affected, said Kaiser spokesman Jeff Hausman.

While guards went on strike at 16 Kaiser facilities, picketers congregated at only five: South Sacramento, Santa Rosa, Fremont, Hayward and Oakland.

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The strike was called by Service Employees International Union Local 24/7, which has tried since November 2005 to organize 1,500 security guards stationed at Kaiser facilities but employed by Pasadena-based Inter-con Security Systems Inc. Workers in Southern California are scheduled to walk off the job Thursday, for one day only.

The union claims Inter-Con officers work for poverty wages, many making as little as $9 an hour. Many cannot afford to buy family health care coverage and do not get paid sick days, the union claims.

Efforts to reach the company were unsuccessful.

About 50 Inter-Con employees work at Kaiser South Sacramento, according to union spokeswoman Jennifer Kelly. Workers were joined on the picket line by strikers from Modesto, swelling the numbers to more than 100, she said.

Hausman put the number at no more than 26.