Lighting a fire under the state’s largest employer requires a deliberate strategy and an engaged membership. This latest collective bargaining report highlights the gains made by nine AFT Connecticut-affiliated public employee unions and chapters. It is a blueprint for how tens of thousands of working people can win a better future – a model adaptable to any labor organization.

Most units within the State Employees Bargaining Agent Coalition (SEBAC) began preparing in late 2024 for contracts expiring in July 2025. Union leaders pooled resources and shared strategies across executive and judicial branch agencies and higher education institutions. This unified approach sustained bargaining teams even after current contracts expired.

Optimism grew last winter when the Judicial Professionals Employees (JPE) Union won an arbitration award for a one-year agreement after declaring impasse.

“This award absolutely sets a precedent for the fair wages all state employees deserve,” JPE President Rob Moreau said at the time. “It also sends a clear message to Governor Lamont that he should take negotiations seriously and offer honorable contracts that reflect workforce needs beyond one year.”

However, negotiations dragged into 2026, risking further delays if settlements weren’t reached before the legislative session adjourned. In mid-March, union leaders mobilized a massive demonstration in Hartford to move the needle. 

Emceeing the event, State Vocational Federation of Teachers President and AFT Connecticut Vice President for Public Employees Makenzi Hurtado (at podium, in photo, above) delivered the coalition’s demands.

“Together, we’re calling on Governor Lamont and outside employers to make recruiting, retaining and reinvesting in the workforce who provide ‘The Connecticut Difference’ a priority. My hope for my children’s and all our children’s futures is that they will have options available for them, and strong, stable services they can depend on throughout their lives.”

Within weeks, 32 tentative agreements were reached. These three- and four-year contracts followed a uniform framework for annual salary increases while securing unit-specific benefits won by individual negotiating committees.

“This contract proves that improving faculty working conditions directly enriches student learning opportunities,” said UConn-AAUP Executive Vice President Andrew Bush. “By securing guaranteed paid parental leave for the first time in our chapter’s history, we have moved beyond traditional labor gains to ‘Bargaining for the Common Good.’”

Members ratified the agreements by strong majorities, and legislative leaders quickly scheduled hearings. Administrative & Residual (A&R) Employees Union President John Disette noted the high political stakes.

“The fact that our contracts are being considered by state lawmakers in the middle of yet another partial federal government shutdown should not be lost on anyone,” he said. “When Washington undermines federal protections, reinvesting in Connecticut’s state workforce matters more than ever.”

The resolution won approval in both chambers, receiving support largely along party lines. Four-year contract provisions are retroactive to July 1, 2025, while three-year agreements take effect July 1, 2026. The framework includes a reopener to determine salaries for the final year of the pacts.

We celebrated our affiliates’ contracts – several of which were secured with the support of AFT Connecticut Field Representative Emily Demicco and legal counsel Eric Chester – on social media:

A&R Employees Union Association of Connecticut Assistant Attorneys General (AAGs) CSU-AAUP Local 6745 JPE Union State Vocational Federation of Teachers UConn-AAUP UCHC-AAUP University Health Professionals (UHP) University of Connecticut Professional Employees Association (UCPEA)

(Editor’s note: at press time, an arbitration decision regarding the contract for our tenth state employee union affiliate, the Federation of Technical College Teachers, had not been reached).

Since our January report, two additional affiliates have also announced wins:

American School for the Deaf Federation of Teachers EastConn Federation of Teachers

A future report is expected to include four additional pending settlements and a recent arbitration victory.

The post Recruiting, Retaining and Reinvesting in the Workforce first appeared on AFT Connecticut.

After surviving a harrowing bedside assault that left her with lasting physical and emotional scars, a courageous healthcare union member is refusing to remain silent. Amber De Souza (left, in photo, above), a constitutional delegate for our AFT Connecticut-affiliated Backus Federation of Nurses, is transforming a personal trauma into a powerful demand for employers to implement standardized violence prevention. In a recent blog post for our national union’s Medium blog, she shared her story to help bring about real solutions for “a systems failure:”

Amber De Souza still remembers how steady she felt that night.

After almost two years in nursing, she had learned to trust her instincts. She had admitted this patient days earlier, watched their condition improve, and noted the small setbacks and adjustments that come with being in the hospital. She was working the night shift now – confident, prepared, doing what nurses do: tracking details, reading people, and staying one step ahead.

Before nursing, De Souza was a mother. She went back to school after having her boys, now 14 and 11. Nursing was her second career, but it had been shaped long before she ever put on scrubs — back when her youngest brother was 17 and fighting T-cell lymphoblastic lymphoma. For months, she watched nurses care for him, and for her family, with a tenderness she never forgot. When he died, the dedication of nurses stayed with her. Years later, those memories pulled her into the profession.

She wanted to be that person for someone else.

A routine moment, and then it wasn’t

At the start of her shift at William W. Backus Hospital in Norwich, nothing felt unusual. The day shift nurse mentioned her patient had grown more agitated – restless, pulling at lines, frustrated about being in bed. A sitter had been placed in the room to keep things safe. During the safety sweep, everything checked out. The patient answered orientation questions correctly and a family member sat quietly nearby.

De Souza moved on to see her other patients.

Then she heard raised voices from the room next door. The patient was trying to get out of bed. De Souza stepped back inside, reintroduced herself, asked orientation questions again. The answers were clear. The patient wasn’t confused – just frustrated.

De Souza asked two patient care techs standing outside the room to help reposition the patient, to make them more comfortable. It was a routine moment, one that nurses navigate every day.

And then it wasn’t. The patient started swinging, and De Souza reacted instantly. She told the patient care techs to step back, this wasn’t safe – for them or for anyone. She called for help and turned toward the family member, explaining what needed to happen next. She took a step closer to the foot of the bed. The kick came fast. The patient lifted their leg and drove their heel into De Souza’s chest. The kick landed beneath her left breast and launched her backward. She slammed into the sitter behind her. If the sitter hadn’t been there, De Souza would have hit the floor.

“I remember seeing stars,” she says. “I couldn’t breathe.”

Everyone in the room froze. De Souza instinctively wrapped her arms around her ribs, trying to protect herself, trying to pull air into her lungs. Even then, her first thought was the patient — making sure they were safe. But the pain was too much.

She left the room. The charge nurse took over, and De Souza headed to the emergency room. In the ER, scans revealed a chest wall contusion, a bruised sternum, and a probable rib fracture. She went home believing she would heal. Three months later, she is still healing from nerve pain, spasms between her ribs and pain that radiates through her breast tissue.

Simple things – lifting, bending, twisting – are off limits. She’s back at work, not at the bedside, but on desk duty. It’s a role that feels foreign to someone who became a nurse to be hands-on.

At home, everything has shifted. Her children worry when she leaves for work. She worries about them worrying.

Emotionally, the weight of the incident lingers. The hospital offered five counseling sessions and because she already had a therapist, she continues the counseling. Trauma doesn’t disappear just because your shift ends.

“You leave your family to take care of other people’s families,” De Souza says. “You never expect to be hurt doing that.”

And yet, she keeps coming back.

She helps new nurses. She answers questions. When she notices warning signs others might miss, she speaks up, because she knows what happens when nurses are left alone in escalating situations.

Since the incident, the hospital has implemented what it calls an “agitation huddle,” meant to be initiated when a patient begins to escalate. In De Souza’s case, when she contacted her charge nurse and security was called, that response would technically qualify.

What continues to trouble her is what comes before that moment. De Souza thinks about how hospitals prepare for emergencies – like how sepsis triggers automatic protocols, staffing, and resources. She wonders why violence is treated differently. Why there isn’t a standard in place when agitation builds, when warning signs appear, when a nurse needs backup before something goes wrong.

“We have sepsis bundles,” De Souza says. “When a patient becomes septic, there are automatic orders and clear pathways. Nurses don’t have to stop and ask.”

With agitation and violence, that standard structure doesn’t exist, she says,. There are no standing protocols embedded in the chart – no pre-ordered support, no automatic escalation, no built-in authority to act early. Nurses are left managing risk in real time, often while caring for multiple patients.

The agitation huddle is one of the improvements De Souza’s local union has urged management to make through its workplace violence prevention committee. Union members insisted on union representation on the committee and a genuine effort to address rising violence in the facility. “Getting management to take the problem seriously, invest in prevention, and work with us is hard, but we are making some progress,” she says.

De Souza views this not only as someone who was injured but also as her unit’s representative for the hospital’s professional governance and a member of the workplace violence committee.

“This isn’t just personal,” she says. “It’s a systems failure – and it’s preventable.”

One of the hardest decisions ever

The incident led to one of the hardest decisions she’s ever made: whether to press charges. When a security guard first asked her, she couldn’t answer. How do you hold a patient accountable – someone you’re trained to protect? She replayed the incident over and over. At first, she couldn’t imagine it. The patient had been under her care. Nurses are trained to understand vulnerability, illness and fear. How do you hold someone accountable when your job is to protect them?

But the details wouldn’t leave her. The patient had been oriented, apologetic and aware. And the security guard offered a comparison she hadn’t considered: when a police officer or EMT is assaulted, circumstances don’t erase accountability. Why should nurses be different?

“If I don’t say anything,” says De Souza, “it’s the next nurse. The next patient care tech.”

She pressed charges but remains conflicted, still carrying the weight of that decision.

What steadied her was her union. The union leadership guided her through workers’ compensation, medical care, and the maze of expectations that followed. The hospital’s first official email explaining how to access occupational health arrived two weeks after the assault. Two weeks of uncertainty. Two weeks of unanswered questions.

Instead, De Souza found herself retelling the story again and again – to HR, legal, managers, doctors, insurance. Each retelling reopened the wound.

“There has to be a better way,” she says. “And I say that because if it weren’t for my union, I would have been totally lost in what was expected of me. Through the solidarity of our union, I found the support I needed.”

De Souza didn’t choose nursing because it was safe or easy. She chose it because she believes in care – deeply, stubbornly, even now. But she also believes compassion should never require silence, and care should never come at the cost of a caregiver’s safety.

She still shows up. But she’s no longer quiet about what needs to change. De Souza is clear about what needs to change: zero tolerance for violence, standardized support for injured healthcare workers, clear communication, and systems that protect caregivers as fiercely as they protect patients.

“There should be a standard of care for healthcare workers,” she says. “End of story.”

Editor’s note: original post by Adrienne Coles, AFT.

The post Demanding a Workplace “Standard of Care” first appeared on AFT Connecticut.

Power at the bargaining table is built in the workplace, at city hall and in the community long before negotiations begin. Our latest quarterly collective bargaining report highlights how one PreK-12 affiliate used year-long organizing and tactical escalation to secure a major victory on the brink of arbitration. Their story offers tangible lessons for labor activists seeking to build the rank-and-file power necessary to make long-term economic gains and worksite improvements.

Leaders of our AFT Connecticut-affiliated New Haven Federation of Teachers launched their campaign with a clear goal: engage members at an unprecedented scale to settle before the statutory arbitration deadline.

“We see opportunities for hands-on learning in everything we do, and this most recent round of negotiations was no exception,” said local union President Leslie Blatteau (front row, third from left, in photo above). “That is why we opened up the process. We started last January, meeting regularly and surveying over 80% of our members to ensure that it’s not just union leadership at the table. The voices, needs and concerns of our members – and our students – were front and center.”

Talks began in September with support from both AFT Connecticut Field Representative Emily Demicco and legal counsel Eric Chester. Despite the union’s proactive approach, district administrators stalled, rejecting reasonable proposals designed to improve both student learning environments and educator working conditions.

By mid-December, after months of district foot-dragging, the negotiating committee declared an impasse. They took the fight to the public, holding a City Hall press conference to demand that elected officials avert mandatory arbitration.

“We must do better – and we can do it together if we act fast,” Ben Scudder (second from left, back row, above) told a crowd of city and district officials, reporters and union members. “There is still a chance for us to negotiate a contract that truly reflects the best interests of our students. New Haven cannot afford to lose hundreds of teachers – like me. But if we don’t negotiate a fair contract, we will. And it will be our students who pay the price.”

The political pressure worked. Days before arbitration was set to begin, the committee and the district reached a tentative three-year agreement.

Key wins in the new contract include:

General Wage Increases: Raises above the state average with annual step movement for all members. Healthcare Savings: A shift to allocation rates that reduce employee costs over the life of the contract. Work-Life Balance: Preserved workday schedules, pre-holiday early dismissals, and protected time for itinerant members and pre-school preparation. Future Protections: A commitment to meet in year two to address class size and enrollment issues.

“We also know there is still a lot of work to be done,” said local union Vice President Jenny Graves (front row, second from left, above). “In the richest state in the richest country in the world, our students should receive a world-class education and safe and welcoming schools that are fully staffed. However, we are the unfortunate characters in the tale of two Connecticuts where wealthy communities thrive, and communities like New Haven struggle to make ends meet.”

Union members overwhelmingly ratified the pact earlier this month. The contract, subsequently approved by the Board of Education, takes effect July 1.

Since our October report, five more affiliates have announced collective bargaining wins:

Meriden Federation of Teachers West Hartford Federation of Residential Counselors Meriden Federation of School-Based Registered Nurses North Branford Federation of Teachers Salem Federation of Teachers

Two additional pending and finalized settlements, as well as a grievance case win, will be included in a future update.

The post Mobilizing Early and Often to Force a Fair Contract first appeared on AFT Connecticut.