Nurses picket outside Grand Park Convalescent Hospital over payment of wages

The owner of a local healthcare staffing agency, along with a handful of nurses she's staffed at Grand Park Convalescent Hospital Tuesday, picket outside the business Tuesday, accusing the hospital of wage theft. 

Carla Coleman, who runs Golden Sunrise Healthcare, said that over the last year she's placed five nurses at the convalescent nursing home, located near West 8th and South Grand View Streets. 

According to Coleman, the owner of the convalescent hospital stopped making regular payments around June and owes her tens of thousands of dollars that she paid out of pocket to make sure her employees were paid. 

"They're not paying me," Coleman told CBSLA. "I've been paying all of my staff out of my own pocket and now I am not going to be able to pay my own mortgage, and I have a 5-year-old daughter and they owe almost $80,000." 

The nurses who picketed alongside Coleman said they support her and said the owner of the nursing home needs to do the right thing. 

"The fact that we're getting treated like this, we are underpaid, understaffed, overworked, 16 hour double shifts, over 60 hours a week...and the fact that I'm not getting paid, it's just wrong," said nurse Kylah Preston. 

"At this point, it's just ridiculous," said another nurse, Darleen Vega. "I shouldn't have to be out here picketing with my boss for them to give us money that we worked hard for." 

No one at the nursing home responded to CBSLA's request that they come out and answer questions about the claims of wage theft. 

According to Bill Padula, a professor at the University of Southern California's School of Pharmacy, the nursing shortage has been a nationwide problem and that it's only worsened since the pandemic. 

"There's a 126,000 openings for nurses in the United States," the professor told CBSLA. "That, however, places facilities in a crunch because they have to pay for this wage increase. So, they might be able to afford to apply these wage increases to their current nursing staff, but they're not going to be able to hire more nursing staff." 

As for Coleman, after CBSLA's story ran, she said that the owner of Grand Park Convalescent Hospital is now working to settle her debt.