UIC Advanced Practice Providers Picket UI Health, Say University “Having It Both Ways” on Bargaining and Withheld Wages

Advanced Practice Providers (APPs) at the University of Illinois Hospital & Health Sciences System, members of Local 73, held informational pickets outside UI Health today to demand the University end more than a year of legal delay tactics, recognize their union, and return to the bargaining table.

The pickets come three days after Local 73 filed an Unfair Labor Practice charge with the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board (IELRB), alleging that the University illegally withheld a 2% wage increase from the 200 APPs in the bargaining unit while simultaneously fighting, in court, its obligation to bargain with them at all.

“The University is trying to have it both ways: withholding cost-of-living increases until we’re at the bargaining table, while filing motion after motion to pause bargaining,” said Jeff Howard, Secretary-Treasurer of Local 73. “Recognize their union, get back to the bargaining table, and start solving some problems — we don’t have time for these games.”

The APP bargaining unit was certified by the IELRB in July 2025. Since then, the University has repeatedly sought to delay its legal obligation to bargain — petitioning the Illinois Appellate Court for review, filing a Motion for Stay of Bargaining Obligation that the IELRB denied, and then winning a stay from the Appellate Court in June 2026 after the Illinois Supreme Court declined to intervene. APPs and the University had bargained from January through June 2026, reaching several tentative agreements and exchanging economic proposals before the stay halted talks.

Days after the stay took effect, University President Timothy Killeen announced a 2% wage increase for campus employees. When the raise took effect on August 16, 2026, every campus worker received it — except the 200 unionized APPs, who have now gone more than two years without a raise or cost-of-living adjustment.

“For over two years, my paycheck has not moved. No raise. No cost-of-living adjustment. Nothing — while the cost of everything else in our lives keeps climbing,” said Tracy Woods, APRN at UIC. “This isn’t just about my paycheck. This is about whether UIC can recruit and retain the Advanced Practice Providers our patients need.”

APPs say the wage freeze compounds existing working conditions concerns, including chronic short-staffing, difficulty taking lunch breaks or using earned sick time, and unresolved questions about pay transparency and equity across the unit.

“At a time when APPs are expected to do more for less, the University is playing games and stall tactics,” said Ashley Milekovsky, APRN at UIC. “The University cannot simultaneously tell a court it needs more time before it bargains and tell its own workers it can’t raise their wages until it bargains. That is having it both ways, and it stops now.”

Cook County Commissioner Candidate Drake Warren (10th District), joined APPs on the picket line in a show of support.

“Two years without a pay increase or cost of living increase is ridiculous, it’s unfair, it’s disrespectful,” said Warren. “The board of trustees should be spending their time helping the workers who are saving lives instead of fighting them.”

Local 73 leadership emphasized that the fight extends beyond wages, pointing to broader threats facing public healthcare workers nationally.

“Access to public healthcare is under attack under the Trump administration. The University of Illinois needs to decide which side they’re on,” said Dian Palmer, President of Local 73. “Are you with the workers on the frontlines, serving some of the most vulnerable communities, or are you going to ignore our issues when we need support the most? Recognize this union. Come back to the table. Give these workers the raise every other worker on this campus already has.”

Local 73 is calling on the University of Illinois to:

• Recognize the Advanced Practice Providers’ bargaining unit and cease further legal challenges to its certification;
• Immediately restore the 2% wage increase to all 200 APPs, retroactive to August 16, 2026; and
• Return to the bargaining table in good faith to reach a fair first contract.

The Unfair Labor Practice charge is currently pending before the IELRB.