Shields to seek another term on Cedar Rapids council

Council member Justin Shields is seeking a second, four-year term to the city's west-side District 5 council seat.

In making his case for re-election to the part-time council post, Shields says he has worked hard for the city and the district - often 12 or more hours a day, he says - and doesn't want to stop.

“I'd like to stay on because I found out one thing about myself: I'm not one who can sit back and see things happen and not try to change them,” the 67-year-old Shields says. “There's a lot of things in this country and in this city that need changing, and I'm going to keep working toward those goals as long as I'm alive, probably.”

Shields, a longtime local labor leader who retired in 2001 from Quaker Co. after 40 years there, says he is a council member who can do at least two things at once – represent the interests of all of Cedar Rapids while fighting for the specific interests of those in his west-side council district.

“There are a lot of things you can do for folks from within your district that does no damage, no harm, doesn't take from anyone else in this city,” he says in explaining his view of how a nine-member council, with five district seats, should work.

Shields says the June 2008 flood and the recovery from it exposed “warts” in city government as he says it would have any city government. Early on after the flood, he says the council promised too much too quickly at a time when he says he knew it was unclear where money would come from or how recovery programs would work.

Now, he says City Hall programs are in place, for instance, to see the city's property buyout program through to completion when it starts soon. Even so, he says the city faces great challenges as it works to figure out how to pay to rebuild.

Shields, who points out that he has been a leading lobbying voice for the city in its pursuit of federal and state flood-recovery funding, says the federal and state governments must continue to help the city out.

Asked about his place among his council colleagues, Shields says he disagrees on many issues with some on the council, but he says he doesn't let policy disagreements become personal ones.

Among the disagreements is his belief that his council colleagues are pushing “infill” development at the expense of long-established neighborhoods.

“We let developers go in, and we don't take into account enough who is there,” Shields says. “There are people in my district whose neighborhoods got changed drastically and for the wrong reasons because of infill development.”

Shields says he is not a big-spending council member, but he says he does favor investing for the future.

Shields was president of his union local for 15 years at Quaker Co. and served as president of the area Hawkeye Labor Council for 11 years. He gained some notice in the 2005 city election when Sen. John Kerry, the Democratic Party's nominee for president in 2004, came to Cedar Rapids to campaign for him.

Shields, 3201 Pebble Dr. SW, is divorced and has two adult daughters and six grandchildren.

He was born in Fairbank, Iowa. He came to Cedar Rapids in 1961, took a job with Quaker Co. and stayed.