Labor council elects Parbs president

Improving labor unity and visibility in the Corridor is the goal of the Hawkeye Labor Council's new president.

The AFL-CIO umbrella group elected Shelley Parbs, a Rockwell Collins production worker, as its new leader last week.

Parbs, 48, of rural Center Point works in printed circuit board production for Rockwell Collins and represents labor on the Regional Workforce Investment Board. She has been auditor of IBEW Local 1362 at Rockwell Collins, and is currently treasurer. She was elected to the labor council's executive board in 2004 after serving a few terms as IBEW Local 1362 delegate.

Parbs is the only woman elected president of the labor group in at least a decade.

“We need to be more out there in the community, and put more of a face on what we do and stand for,” said Parbs, whose daughter is a member of the Service Employees International Union at the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics.

Parbs said she also hopes to see the group become more of a unified voice for organized labor in the area.

The presidency of the labor council was held for 11 years by Justin Shields of Cedar Rapids, retired president of the Retail Wholesale and Department Store Workers Local 110 at Quaker Oats.

Shields successfully won election to the Cedar Rapids City Council, but lost his bid for re-election as labor council president last year to Jerry Nowadzky of the Machinists Local 831.

Other officers elected to council posts last week were: Dave Hogan, Carpenters Local 308, first vice president; Rich Becker, Sheet Metal Workers Local 263, second vice president; Tom Haugen, IBEW Local 1362, recording secretary; and Randy Sconyers, Sheet Metal Workers Local 263, treasurer.

Parbs said she would like to see the labor council revive its traditional Labor Day picnic, which was dropped in 2008 amid the city's struggles for recovery from the June 2008 flood.

Last year, the council had a day at the ballpark with the Cedar Rapids Kernels instead.

The council is a voice for AFL-CIO affiliated labor unions in seven area counties.

It has been without an executive director since February 2008.

Parbs said she expects the question of whether to fill the position to be discussed again after no

consensus was reached on filling the slot last year.