A health care worker’s union that regularly negotiates as an adversary of hospital administrators wants to use Oregon’s initiative process to advance its agenda.

Local 49 of the Service Employees International Union represents 15,000 health care workers in Oregon and Southeast Washington, according to its website. On Monday, it filed five ballot measures concerning hospital transparency, compensation and pricing that it hopes to see on the November 2014 ballot.

The union plans to begin gathering required signatures after ballot titles are established.

According to the SEIU website, the proposals would:

• Make hospital quality ratings public.

• Force hospitals to post prices.

• Set minimums for charity care.

• Require “reasonable” pricing for services.

• Cap executive salaries “at no more than 15 times the wages of the lowest paid employee.”

In support of the executive salary proposal, SEIU cites St. Charles Health System President and CEO Jim Diegel, stating that his 2011 compensation was 29 times that of the health system’s lowest paid worker. St. Charles spokeswoman Lisa Goodman told us her calculations show the number should be 21 rather than 29, but that would still be well above the SEIU goal of 15. Whatever those details, we don’t think voters should be in the business of telling a company what it should pay its employees.

While we support some of the ideas behind the proposed measures, the initiative process is the wrong avenue in which to pursue them.

First, the timing is wrong. The state and nation are overwhelmed trying to absorb the impacts of the Affordable Care Act and related efforts, and a separate set of initiatives would only complicate and confuse that process.

Second, ballot measures shouldn’t be used to push for union demands.

And finally, these proposals oversimplify complex issues and ignore legitimate challenges.

We urge voters to decline to sign these petitions and vote no if the measures do reach the ballot.