Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, August 4, 1995 TAG: 9508040028
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DAN CASEY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
The eight-day trip will take Bowers and six area residents to Brazil, where Bowers will sign a sister city agreement with Florianapolis, Brazil.
The group will spend five days there and two days sight-seeing in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil's largest city.
Traveling with the mayor will be David Lisk, a former city councilman who serves as executive director of the sister city committee; Charlene Kalinoski, a professor at Roanoke College; Shirley Kotheimer, a retired school teacher; John Makay, a retired businessman; William Reid, former administrator at Community Hospital; and Marylen Harmon, a Roanoke County schoolteacher.
Florianapolis is Roanoke's fourth sister city. A relationship with Wonju, Korea, was formed 30 years ago. In recent years, Kisumu, Kenya, and Pskov, Russia, have been added to the list. Bowers said efforts are under way to build a similar relationship with a city in China.
Situated on an island, Florianapolis is home to about 300,000 people. It is the capital of the Brazilian state of Santa Catarina, which is a sister state to Virginia.
The relationship began developing this year with a visit by a delegation from Florianapolis to Roanoke.
Lisk said Florianapolis is a popular vacation resort for Brazilians, Germans and Argentines. The island has 52 beaches. Although it is winter in Brazil now, Florianapolis has a climate similar to that in Jacksonville, Fla. Temperatures average in the high 60s during the day and in the 40s at night, Lisk said.
Each person's travel cost comes to about $1,700, Lisk said. As in past trips by former Mayor Noel Taylor, expenses for the mayor's travel are being raised through private donations to the Sister City Committee, Lisk said.
Bowers paid the entire cost of his trip to Pskov in May 1993, except for a $171 unspecified expense for which he was reimbursed by the city. Though Bowers asked the committee to pay for his airfare, it refused because it was not an official committee trip, Lisk said.
But Bowers believes that in the future, taxpayers ought to foot the bill for the mayor's foreign travel to sister cities, much like they pay for trips inside the United States for conferences and other meetings.
"To be honest with you, the city's going to have to develop some policy on that," Bowers said. "I share peoples' concerns about the expense of things like this. My assessment is we do it in a very modest way. If it was an extravagance, I'd be concerned also."
The committee is planning a trip to Wonju next year to mark the 30th anniversary of its sister city relationship with Roanoke, Bowers said.
by CNB