A bill is now in front of a Texas Senate committee.
House Bill 128 would restrict such relationships with communities in countries deemed a 鈥渇oreign adversary,鈥� including China.
But District 3 Councilman Michael Crain, the council鈥檚 liaison to Guaiyang, told 四虎影院鈥檚 Sam Baker he sees no need for the bill.
"What I'll say is that there are thoughts that there is some counterintelligence espionage organizations that maybe have infiltrated sister city relationships," Crain said. "Fort Worth, we have no relationship with any organization such as that. This is a volunteer-led, volunteer-driven organization."
Crain served as chief of staff to the U.S. Embassy under the Bush administration from 2006 to 2009, and lived there until 2014. He was also part of the exploratory committee that settled on Guiyong.
The below excerpts are edited for length and clarity.
The stakes for Fort Worth
As written, we would have to sever our relationship with Guiyang, which is a beautiful city and with some beautiful people. Fort Worth chose it because of its minority population, the Miao population, who are beautiful people. Their traditional garb and headdresses that are made out of tin. It's a beautiful part of the country. So what would be at stake is that exchange where people can understand other parts of China.
We look at China as a holistic one, but it is made up just like the United States of different people in different parts. If someone says, "where do I go visit the United States," we're like, well, are you talking about the cities or the beaches or the mountains? And China's made up that same way. So that's my fear.
It's also my fear that Chinese students learning about the United States 鈥� that we're not some big ogre of a country, that we really are beautiful people 鈥� will be denied that opportunity. And our own children being able to travel to China to see all of that as well.
Why did Fort Worth choose Guaiyang?
In the late 2000s 鈥� 2010, 2011 鈥� there was a big, massive push, I think across the country, of building relations with China. It's a global behemoth: 1.4 billion people live there. Companies were entering into China in record droves, and that's what I did for a period time: help executives that were looking at inbound-outbound investment in China. So it was natural for cities to start exploring those relationships.
That was a conversation that happened at the national level. They made introductions, as is the process when any municipality wants to explore a sister-city relationship 鈥� the national organization will make the introductions. I think there were about four or five cities that were put on the list, and there was a team that came over and explored different parts.
The real kicker for Fort Worth is that the minority population, the Miao population, it's a rural part of China. It's, you know, 5 or 6 million people that live there, but still a rural part of China, and so I think there was just some connection with this sort of cowboy-esque attitude that they have there, too, much like the culture here in Fort Worth. The culture just matched. And I think the group liked it, and that's how they moved forward.
The purpose of sister cities
The organization itself was established by President Eisenhower, and his idea was: If people can just get to know people on a person-to-person level, we may avoid future conflicts. That when the government fails, when they can't negotiate, understanding that people are just like us and we want the same things. We want to raise a healthy family. We want provide for them. We want them to grow up, our children to grow in a world that's safe for them. So that was the idea behind it, and that's how it's existed for 60, 70, 80-plus years of this relationship, and really establishing those relationships.
While there may be a national organization, Sister Cities International, really these are all driven by the cities. We have our own private nonprofit here in Fort Worth, but other cities run them out of the cities themselves.
Benefits for Fort Worth
There's an economic impact to the city because you have groups traveling here. There's also been businesses established. I can speak to a partnership that happened with a major whiskey company here when they went to Japan, and getting them into stores there. We have, you know, nine sister-city relationships across the world. Those exchanges about two or three a year, official exchanges 鈥� a group of us will go to Indonesia in June. All of these exchanges I think are important. And if you think about it from the economic level, you think from the student exchange level, and there's also adult exchanges too.
I'll say my own children have benefited. One has been to Neme, France. Both are going to Japan, to Nagaoka this summer. But you look at the groups that go over there, we send teachers as part of those groups. These are mostly public school teachers that wouldn't have an experience otherwise, and they're the chaperones for the kids. These students stay with families while they're there. And then we reciprocally host students here. We'll be hosting a student from Japan this summer. And I think all of that exposure just helps people understand the world is a very small place and we all have to learn to work together.
