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TABLE OF CONTENTSAustin Sister Cities General Materials, 1980-2000 Adelaide, Australia, 1983-2004 Belo Horizonte, Brazil, 1963-1967 |
Austin (Tex.). Economic Development Department. Sister and Friendship Cities Program RecordsAn Inventory of the Collection
Administrative HistoryAll Sister City programs take place under the auspices of Sister Cities International, a nonprofit citizen diplomacy network that creates and strengthens partnerships between United States and international communities. Sister Cities International was founded by President Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1956 and is a 501(c) (3) non-profit which serves as a national membership organization for the individual sister cities across the United States. According to the Sister Cities International website (www.sister-cities.org) "Sister Cities International advances peace and prosperity through cultural, educational, humanitarian, and economic development exchanges. It serves as a hub for institutional knowledge and best practices in the field of citizen diplomacy." The network connects thousands of citizens and volunteers across 140 countries in 6 continents. The City of Austin's involvement in the Sister Cities Program began in 1965 with the establishment a formal relationship with Belo Horizonte, Brazil as its Sister City (deactivated in 1991). Several years later a relationship with Saltillo, Mexico was established. Additional sister cities added in the 1970s and 1980s were Maseru, Lesotho, South Africa (1978); followed by Lima, Peru (1981); Adelaide, South Australia (1983); and Taichung, Taiwan (1986). In the late 1980s the City recognized that the Sister Cities program was operating without specific missions, goals, objectives, work plans and fiscal guidelines and it was determined (Resolution 19900111-44) that the Austin City Council would create and maintain an International Sister Cities Executive Committee and a set of policies and procedures were created to guide the Committee. In the 1990s and 2000s the sister cities of Oita City, Japan (1990); Koblenz, Germany (1992); Xishuangbanna, Yunan Province of China (1997); Old Orlu, Nigeria (2000); Gwangmyeong, Korea (2000); City of Antalya, Turkey (2008); Angers, France (2011); London Borough of Hackney, United Kingdom (2014) were added. Through the years the City of Austin has participated in educational exchanges at every grade level; building career skills for Austinites through apprenticeships; humanitarian aid projects; and cultural, sustainable development and business/economic development exchanges with its Sister Cities. In addition to Sister Cities, Austin has three Friendship Cities: Siem Reap, Cambodia, Tehuacán, Mexico and Villefranche-sur-mer, France. Current policy in Austin, Texas requires that Sister City relationships are first established by the City of Austin Economic Development Program. The city must establish a Memorandum of Understanding between one or more organizations in Austin and the international city to pursue in exchange beneficial to both cities. These cities must then undergo two years of this exchange. Then, the Mayor, or highest municipal official, of each city must approve a Sister City Agreement. After this approval, a Texas committee of at least fifteen individuals must form to coordinate exchanges between Austin and the international city. A majority of those committee members should be residents of the Austin Metropolitan Statistical Area. The committee must also achieve 501 (c) 3 non-profit status by the Internal Revenue Service. Return to the Table of Contents Scope and ContentsThe materials in the collection document the work and governance of the Austin Sister City program including engaging in economic development, humanitarian and cultural visits; arranging school and vocational exchange programs; planning special projects and events to celebrate and promote the relationship between the sister cities; fundraising; and creating City of Austin policies and procedures regarding the Sister Cities Program. These activities are represented in meeting minutes, festival and event fliers, souvenir certificates, travel itineraries, correspondence, newspaper clippings, reports and photographs that span the years 1963 through 2004. As there wasn't a formal program for the transfer of Austin Sister Cities Program records in the past not all of the Sister Cities are represented in the collection, and of those represented, the amount of documentation varies depending upon how proactive the individual Sister City committee was in donating materials. The Austin Sister Cities General Materials series (1980-2000) documents the organization of the program as a whole and relationship with Sister Cities International. Included are articles of incorporation and bylaws of the Austin Sister Cities Foundation; Executive Committee meeting minutes and working papers; reports from the individual Sister Cities committees to the Executive Committee; annual meeting programs, certificates and correspondence from Sister Cities International; and reports, correspondence and newsletters from the Institute of Policy Studies. Of interest are the various drafts of policies and procedures and correspondence regarding the effort in the late 1980s and early 1990s to clarify the goals, objectives, work plans and fiscal guidelines of the program. Materials in the Adelaide, Australia series (1983-2004) documents the visits of Adelaide government officials to Austin and the Mayor Bruce Todd led trade mission to Adelaide as well as other economic development and cultural exchanges that took place in the 1980s and 1990s. These trip documents include correspondence, itineraries, travel details, memorabilia and programs. Also included are Austin-Adelaide Sister City Committee meeting minutes, brochures, proposals and press releases; reports; and newspaper clippings that highlight the activities of the Committee. The Belo Horizonte, Brazil series (1963-1967) series includes a copy of the resolution documenting the establishment of the first Austin Sister City relationship between Belo Horizonte and Austin (now defunct); correspondence from Austin Mayor Lester Palmer to Mayor Oswaldo Pierucetti of the City of Belo Horizonte, Brazil; and newspaper clippings and memorabilia. The Gwangmyeong, Korea series (2000-2001) series contains a limited amount of materials including Austin-Gwangmyeong (Kwangmyong) Sister City proposal, Committee member list, a newspaper clipping and booklet about the first visit the Gwangmyeong delegation made to Austin. The majority of the Koblenz, Germany series (1986-2001) is comprised of materials concerning the logistics and activities of the trade, business, cultural and educational exchanges between the Koblenz and Austin in the 1990s. Included are correspondence, draft and final itineraries, newspaper clippings, photographs and memorabilia. In addition, there are several Austin-Koblenz Sister City Committee annual reports, materials documenting the German American Association of Austin's involvement with the Sister City Program and two recordings of Koblenz exchange students receiving honorary citizenship certificates during Austin City Council meetings on March 1, 2001 and April 8, 1999. The Austin-Lima Sister Cities Committee and their activities are the most well documented of all the City of Austin Sister Cities. The Lima, Peru series (1981-2003) makes up half of total collection size, and the majority of the materials were donated by Cecilia Bustamante, who was involved both with the Austin-Lima Sister Cities Committee as chair and as a member of the City of Austin Sister Cities Executive Committee. The Administrative Materials subseries (1981-2002) contains meeting minutes, correspondence, reports, work plans and membership lists documenting the work of both the Austin-Lima Committee and their meetings as well as the Bustamante's participation in the Sister Cities Executive Committee as a representative of the Austin-Lima organization. Also included is communication with the Sister City office in Lima, Sister Cities International, the United States Embassy and the United States Department of State. The Correspondence subseries (1981-2002) includes correspondence to and from the City of Austin Mayor's office to Lima government officials and Cecilia Bustamante; emails from Camille Donoghue, Austin Sister Cities coordinator, to the Austin-Lima Sister City Committee; and Committee letters and email concerning programing and planning of various events and visitor exchanges. Copies of press releases and mock-ups of newsletters sent out by the Austin-Lima Sister Cities, as well as copies of newspaper clipping about the Sister Cities program, make up the Publicity subseries (1981-1999). The Conferences (1987-2000), Festivals and Events (1991-2003), Educational Programs (1990-2003) and Special Projects (1985-2003) subseries document the various events, programs and projects that the Austin-Lima Sister Cities Committee organized and/or participated in from the late 1980s to the early 2000s. Most of the festivals or events focused on the arts and were held in Austin and promoted writers, film makers and artists from Peru and/or South America. The most prominent events were the Fall Literacy Festival and the Poetry Festival. The materials include arrangement details for the venues and with the participants as well as promotional materials advertising the events. The educational programs materials document the relationships between Austin and Lima elementary and middle schools and attempts to create a similar relationship between libraries in the form of correspondence and reports. In addition, the Austin-Lima Sister City organization served as the liaison between Austin Community College and Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos in Lima and flyers, correspondence, newspaper clippings and planning documents highlight this relationship. The Committee was also involved in a variety of special projects in Peru, most of which were humanitarian in nature. The collection contains correspondence, programs, fundraising materials, newspaper clippings, reports and photographs that highlight projects such as the Cabeceras Aid Project, Bread for the Poor, cleft palate surgery project Austin Smiles and other medical missions, hunger relief project Pan y Peces, and raising money and awareness for the cholera epidemic in Peru. Lastly, the Visits and Exchanges subseries (1986-2001) contains planning documents, correspondence, itineraries and newspaper clippings documenting the various visits and exchanges between the two cities including the official visit of Mayor of La Molina, Lima, Rafael Lopez Mobilia, The Maseru, Lesotho series (1990-1997) contains a limited amount of reports created by the Austin-Maseru Sister City Committee outlining their activities and correspondence. The materials in the Oita, Japan series (1986-1998) document the agreement between Austin and Oita highlighted by the resolution, articles of incorporation, the agreement concerning future exchange programs and a documentary (video recording) of the Oita-Austin Sister City agreement. Also included are reports of the activities, meeting minutes and membership lists of the Austin-Oita Sister City Committee. In addition there are travel arrangement documents, copies of speeches, correspondence between the city's mayors, schedules, programs, reports, newspaper clippings and memorabilia that provide insight into the activities engaged in during government delegation visits and student exchanges. The Old Orlu, Nigeria series (2000) consists of materials documenting the formation of the Austin/ Old Orlu Sister City program. Included are two VHS tapes from a Capital City African American Chamber of Commerce meeting that detail the Economic Mission to Imo State in Nigeria, where Old Orlu is located. A Friendship City declaration signed by the Mayor of Porto Alegre is the only document contained in the Porto Alegre, Brazil series (2002). The Saltillo, Mexico series (1981-2004) contains materials generated by the Austin-Saltillo Sister City Committee in their efforts to foster a relationship between the two cities. Included are Committee reports and travel documents for several trade and cultural visits between the two cities including invitations, programs, brochures and copies of historical documents that document Mayor Frank Cooksey and his wife's trip to Saltillo as part of the 409th Anniversary of Saltillo. The materials in the Taichung, Taiwan series (1986-1997) include activity reports of the Austin-Taichung Sister City Committee as well as planning documents, memorabilia, itineraries and correspondence documenting visits between the two cities. The Xishuangbanna, China series (1999) contains a documentation of a proposed delegation from Austin traveling to China. Return to the Table of Contents
Return to the Table of Contents RestrictionsRestrictions on AccessOpen to all users. Advance notice is required for any audiovisual materials that do not have an access copy already created. Turnaround time for requested access copies will be no less than one week and is determined by the number of items requested and their duration. Restrictions on UseThe Austin History Center (AHC) is the owner of the physical materials in the AHC collections and makes available reproductions for research, publication, and other uses. Written permission must be obtained from the AHC before any publication use. The AHC does not necessarily hold copyright to all of the materials in the collections. In some cases, permission for use may require seeking additional authorization from the copyright owners. Consult repository for more details. Return to the Table of Contents
Return to the Table of Contents Related Material
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Return to the Table of Contents Administrative InformationPreferred CitationAustin (Tex.). Economic Development Department. Sister and Friendship Cities Program Records (AR.1992.014). Austin History Center, Austin Public Library, Texas. Acquisition InformationDonor #: DO/2002/010 Donation Date: 2001-2007 Donor #: DO/1992/058 Donation Date: 1992-2005 Donor #: DO/1995/018 Donation Date: 1995-2006 Processing InformationFinal Processing and Finding Aid By: Ali Dzienkowski, Lauren Stealey, Evelyn Veasey, December 2014. Updated by Molly Hults in 2015. Return to the Table of Contents Detailed Description of the Collection
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