Minnesota nurses who walked out for one day earlier this month voted overwhelmingly Monday to authorize an open-ended strike on 14 hospitals in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area.
The Minnesota Nurses Association said 84 percent of nurses voted yes to authorize the longer strike. The union needed at least 66 percent of voting nurses to support such a job action.
Nurses must give the hospitals a minimum of 10 days' notice but could strike anytime after that. The union said it wouldn't issue a strike notice "as long as productive negotiations are continuing."
About 12,000 nurses went on a one-day strike on June 10, saying they wanted increased staffing in the hospitals and didn't want cuts to their pension.
A spokeswoman for the hospitals says the union's staffing proposals are unnecessary and very expensive, but the hospitals are willing to negotiate under certain conditions.
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