Leadership


Henry Nicholas	Kathy Sackman

Donna Ford	Craig Ford

NUHHCE Executive Secretary

Donna Ford, executive vice president of District 1199C of the National Union of Hospital and Health Care Employees, and Executive Secretary of the national union, officially retired from her leadership position in Philadelphia in April 2007. However, she remains a national officer of NUHHCE.

Mrs. Ford, a mother and grandmother, has been a successful organizer, negotiator and union executive for more than three decades. She joined the hospital workers unionizing movement in 1970.

Mrs. Ford began her union career when she organized her coworkers at the Uniontown Hospital in Uniontown, Pennsylvania, her hometown. After that campaign was completed, Mrs. Ford decided to utilize her leadership and organizing skills to help the fledging hospital workers union, so she left her young children with her parents and moved to Philadelphia.

Over several years, she worked and traveled for the national union, going home to be with her family whenever she could get away — mostly on weekends.

Due to her efforts and those of others, including Henry Nicholas, president of 1199C and the national union, District 1199C was established. Today more than 13,000 health care workers in 85 hospitals, nursing homes and mental health and mental retardations facilitations throughout Philadelphia and South Jersey have union representation owing to her efforts.

In 1973, Mrs. Ford was elected vice president of the newly created National Union of Hospital and Health Care Employees. In 1983, she was elected Executive Secretary of the national union.

In the ensuing years, Mrs. Ford (who later relocated her family to live with her in Philadelphia) would continue to serve as a strong voice for union members at the bargaining table and in worker-management disputes. In addition, she was involved in the establishment of the Philadelphia Party which led eventually to elections of Mayor W. Wilson Goode, Mayor John Street and Governor Ed Rendell.