Longtime Chicago AFTRA executive director Eileen Willenborg said she wasn’t expecting her name to be mentioned during the announcements for the recipients of the George Heller Memorial Gold Card. When she heard her name, along with AFTRA president Roberta Reardon and national executive director Kim Roberts Hedgepeth, Willenborg said she was “blown away.”

Willenborg became only the 55^th recipient of the Gold Card since 1937. The selection process is secretive

Eileen Willenborg

“It’s recognition of a lot of hard work on my part, but also the hard work of my staff and members,” Willenborg said. “I’m the public face. We have a partnership in the local and I think it’s been a successful partnership between staff and membership and the grass roots of the membership.”

The partnership will likely go on, but not with Willenborg, who will retire at the end of the year.

Willenborg has spent her entire career working in labor relations, first as a labor lawyer in private practice, then as council for the Association of Flight Attendants before moving to AFTRA in 1995. After her retirement, she intends on working for the local two days a week, to help transition her successor, and she will be working pro-bono for various causes she hasn’t had time for.

Willenborg was one of the strategic leaders in the 2000 strike by SAG and AFTRA against commercial producers. She also helped found the Illinois Production Alliance, and was its first president. She has worked hard to help grow the indigenous film industry in Illinois, and was instrumental in lobbying for Illinois’ film tax incentives.

A successor is expected to be named in September.