Nurses at the NewYork-Presbyterian Brooklyn Methodist Hospital picketed today after more than a week of failed contract negotiations.

Following 10 days of negotiations and what the union is calling a “terrible staffing proposal", the nurses were picketing outside the hospital since Thursday morning.

The association says hospital management doubled down on staffing cuts to several units including labor and delivery, mother-baby, and chemotherapy infusion. They say that means nurses would be expected to do more overtime to fill those gaps when nurses are already burnt out.

The union is also criticizing the hospital for refusing to reopen an in-patient psychiatric unit making the emergency room overcrowded.

The strike comes after nurses from several other private sector hospitals have successfully negotiated contracts in the last few months, including NewYork-Presbyterian in Manhattan.