To Explore ‘Sister City’ Idea—

Llodra, Stocker Head To China

By John Voket

About a year ago, as an educational delegation was forming bonds between Newtown and Liaocheng in the Shandong Province of China, First Selectman Pat Llodra said she received an invitation from the city’s mayor to travel there to explore the possibility of forming a “sister city” initiative between the two communities.

This week Mrs Llodra was scheduled to make the trip to visit Mayor Lin Fenghai in Liaocheng, paying her own way and tagging along with an educational delegation that was to depart to China on April 12. Newtown’s Economic and Community Development Director Elizabeth Stocker was also slated to join the group, although she and the first selectman will have a decidedly different itinerary than that of the school-based contingent.

(See related story on the education contingent in this week’s print edition or at newtownbee.com)

“We’ll be doing tours of local businesses and industries, and checking in with companies that may or could have joint ventures with companies in Newtown and the region,” Ms Llodra told The Bee ahead of her departure. “The mayor of Middletown just got back from a trip there, and I plan to contact him to see what he learned before we head out on Thursday. He traveled there with [state Department of Economic and Community Development] officials.”

Mrs Llodra could not predict if she and Ms Stocker could forge any relationships to bring some economic benefits back to Newtown, but the pair would be exploring any opportunity to do so. Both officials said they felt it was worth the personal investment of about $3,000 out of pocket to make the trip.

“The only benefit, if you could even call it that, is that we’re taking up a couple of the extra seats on the school group’s tour and paying the group rate,” Mrs Llodra said, adding that she was recently made aware of the available seats from Newtown High School Assistant Principal and Newtown International Center for Education (NICE) Program Coordinator Jason Hiruo.

“This is very exploratory,” Mrs Llodra said. “We don’t know what kind of, if any, language barrier we will be facing, but we’ve had several e-mails from the Liaocheng economic development commissioner going back more than a year, which started the ball rolling.”

She said the Chinese mayor of Liaocheng, also known as the “Water City,” said since Newtown and his community already have sister schools, why not have a sister city situation as well.

“The purpose of our trip is really to see what other ideas we can come up with beyond the educational arena that could benefit both communities,” Mrs Llodra said.

While she is out of the country, Selectman Will Rodgers will serve in her stead as the elected town agent.