Mayo Clinic rejected a compromise offer by SEIU Healthcare Minnesota Tuesday regarding Mayo’s plan to transition its food and service workers to an out-of-state company over the next 12 to 18 months.

SEIU offered Mayo the chance to “choose any management team or food service program to create menus and organize the dietary department,” in its Aug. 22 offer. The union wanted all dietary employees to remain employed by Mayo. In exchange, the union offered to provide a training grant of up to $25,000 from union members’ dues to train employees on the new program and the menus.

Mayo announced in June its tentative decision to transition its food and nutrition services from Sodexo to Atlanta-based Morrison Healthcare. The contract with Morrison will be over 10 years.

The change impacts 56 Mayo Clinic Health System employees in Albert Lea and Austin who were managed by Sodexo.

In a statement explaining Mayo Clinic’s decision, a hospital spokeswoman said the offer “essentially outlined a scenario quite similar to what is currently in place, and also did not address any of the reasons for needing to make this change.”

SEIU President Jamie Gulley said in a written statement that he was disappointed with Mayo’s rejection of the offer, noting his concern with what he called “Mayo’s controversial plan to outsource these 700 workers.”

“Rochester deserves to know what this will mean for the community, and we will continue to use all avenues at our disposal to try to get Mayo to publicly release the details around this deal so all of us, not just Mayo executives, understand what the full impact will be,” Gulley said. “We firmly believe they need to reconsider the decision, but also that Mayo owes the workers and the community the respect of saying who made the decision, why the decision was made, and how and what impact it will have on both workers and the seniors who could see higher Medicare costs if they go through with this controversial plan.”

Gulley said in a guest column published Monday in the Rochester Post-Bulletin that the decision to transition food service companies could be bad for seniors in the community, noting his belief that seniors could see prices they are charged for services at Mayo increased.

“We should all care about this apparent injustice and demand that Mayo come clean concerning what it’s agreement with Morrison says,” Gulley said. “We call on those executives to revisit this decision and do right by their workers, patients, and the whole community.”

In response to Gulley’s column, Mayo said any change in the wage index would not impact inpatient Medicare payments.

Mayo said its goals in the change are to “improve quality, consistency, efficiency, and to create a structure and system that will foster accountability for these objectives.”

Mayo Clinic cited numbers that show overall patient satisfaction with food service is less than 50 percent.

“Our patients and customers expect and deserve better,” Mayo stated.

Mayo Clinic officials have stated that all food and nutrition staff employed by Mayo Clinic and those employed by previous vendors will be offered employment at Morrison Healthcare at the employees’ current wages.

There remains disagreement on the transition, however.

Hundreds of food service workers picketed in front of St. Marys Hospital last week. A delegation of food service workers delivered a petition signed by more than 1,200 Mayo employees to Mayo’s human resources department.

The SEIU has proposed Mayo publicly collect the scores of food service workers and compare them with scores from hospitals in other states are currently subcontracted over 18 months.

The next bargaining session is scheduled for Sept. 19.