The ongoing strike at Butler Hospital has now lasted six weeks. Many view the conflict as a local dispute between Butler and 1199 SEIU NE over wages, benefits, retirement, and working conditions. However, those of us closest to the situation know better.
Butler Hospital has been a pillar in our community since the mid-1800s. It cares for the most vulnerable populations in our state, providing more than half of the inpatient care for patients needing behavioral and psychiatric care. It also houses the academic departments of Psychiatry and Psychology that have a national reputation for advancing knowledge and care in these fields.
When the pandemic hit, Butler opened its doors, providing much-needed capacity and care during that crisis. In summary, Butler Hospital is a shining jewel in the crown of Rhode Island health care.
However, this strike is not just about Butler. It is about a broader, coordinated campaign to reset the balance of power across Rhode Island’s entire health care sector. And Butler has become the chosen battleground.
Advertisement
From the beginning, Care New England has negotiated in good faith and with complete transparency (butlerinfoforyou.org), offering wage increases, staffing improvements, and enhanced benefits within the limits of our nonprofit system. However, it has become increasingly clear that SEIU’s goals extend far beyond Butler’s campus.
In recent meetings, the union has openly discussed “setting a template” for statewide labor actions. They’re framing this as a strategic escalation against hospital leaders, while also expanding their campaign to the government, board members, banks, and civic organizations.
Advertisement
Unlike SEIU, other unions have chosen not to strike and to continue negotiations, despite having a strike authorization, whereas SEIU decided on an indefinite strike. They are coordinating with political activists, using community events, and targeting our Board of Trustees with public pressure tactics aimed at intimidating rather than engaging.
In short, this is not a conventional labor dispute — it’s the front line of a much larger campaign, strategically engineered to reshape health care labor relations across the state. That may be a goal worthy of debate. But it cannot come at the expense of a single hospital’s stability — or of the patients and families who rely on it.
Let me be clear: we respect the right of workers to organize and advocate for better compensation, benefits, retirement, and working conditions. However, Butler Hospital is a behavioral health facility that serves some of the most vulnerable Rhode Islanders. It was never meant to be a stage for a political theater of escalation.
The damage being done is real: critical behavioral health programs across the state were already strained, and capacity at Butler is now being reduced out of necessity because of the union’s action. A vital community resource is being put at risk — not because of its policies or finances, but because it was chosen as a beachhead for a broader conflict.
There’s a moral price for that. And a practical one as well.
We must not allow the illusion of a righteous movement to obscure the deeper reality: when a strike becomes a symbolic crusade, it stops being about resolution and starts being about power. The people of Rhode Island deserve better. Our patients deserve better. And our health care workforce — union and non-union alike — deserves leadership that seeks solutions, not standoffs.
Advertisement
There is still a path forward. It begins with an honest consideration of Butler’s actual circumstances — not those of other hospitals, not ideological ambitions, not long-term organizing goals. The future of health care in Rhode Island should be shaped through collaboration, not coercion.
We want the workers on strike to return to their positions.
We urge the union to end the strike and return to work, allowing our leaders to focus on the negotiations while the employees focus on the patients who need them. If this doesn’t happen, we will continue to encourage more workers to cross the line to join those who have already courageously done so. Plus, we will be forced to explore further reductions.
Continuing the strike will only reduce access to behavioral health services across the state — at a time when our most vulnerable patients need these services more than ever.
This is not about winning a narrative. It’s about doing the right thing. We encourage Butler employees to return to their positions to do what they do best — caring for patients.
Dr. Michael Wagner is the president and CEO of Care New England.