A lawsuit on behalf of more than 300 hospital employees suddenly fired in July was filed Friday in Tucsonβs U.S. District Court.
The Santa Cruz Valley Regional Hospital promised employees extended health insurance and pay when it announced mass layoffs in June, but those promises were not kept when the now-closed hospital fired most of its employees in July.
βI hope to help my former co-workers obtain what was stolen from them, and to show the community that no one, not even a corporate hospital, is above the law,β said Stephanie Garrett, a registered nurse who pursued the class action on behalf of herself and her colleagues.
The complaint, which names Garrett and βall others similarly situated,β is being pursued by a law firm based in New York City, Raisner Roupinian LLP, which specializes in advocating for βvictims of layoffs and shutdowns.β Locally, attorney Kasey C. Nye of Tucsonβs Waterfall, Economidis, Caldwell, Hanshaw & Villamana is helping with the case.
The attorneys are asking the court to order payment βequal to the sum of: their unpaid wages, salary, commissions, bonuses, accrued holiday pay, accrued vacation pay, and 401(k) contributions and other COBRA benefits, for 60 days.β
Roughly 300 health care providers and other employees, about 200 full-time, were working for Green Valleyβs only hospital when it shut down June 30.
βAfter announcing on June 24 the surprise June 30 closure, the defendant sent employees a letter on June 28 reassuring them βwe will still be paying employees till (sic) August 20th,ββ the legal complaint reads.
βThe June 28 letter also told the full-time employees that they were required to report to work as scheduled, because βwe have lots of work ahead of us, and we will need all the help we can get.ββ
The companyβs former CEO, Stephen Harris, said during a previous interview that workers would receive pay and health insurance through Aug. 20. Employees say they were also told they would receive compensation for up to 80 hours of unused vacation pay.
Harris declined to comment on the lawsuit. Lateral Investment Managementβs Richard de Silva has not responded to interview requests. Lateral Investment is the facilityβs operator, but itβs owned by a Rochester, New York, company called Broadstone Net Lease, Inc.
The initial 60-day notice to the employees was given under the protection of the WARN Act, which is administered by the U.S. Department of Labor and stands for Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act.
But on July 21, employees received a termination letter in which they were told, βyou will no longer be entitled to any further compensation, monies or other benefits from SCVRH, including coverage under any benefits plans or programs sponsored by SCVRH, except as described hereinbelow.β
The letter then details that the final paycheck, deposited on or before July 29, would include full pay.
Several employees said that is not what happened, however. Instead, only partial pay was included, and any paid-time-off employees used to round out their hours was removed from the paycheck.
They also said they still had insurance withdrawals made, even though their insurance is no longer effective.
Since the start of the pandemic, Green Valley's Santa Cruz Valley Regional Hospital has been flooded with millions in public funds. It closed in June.
Santa Cruz Valley Regional Hospital's one hope was to be bought out by Tucson's TMC HealthCare but that plan fell through a couple weeks back.Β
