The decision by some Charlottesvillians to jet set to a foreign city to explore exchange opportunities may sound familiar, but officials say that the imminent trip to Winneba, Ghana, will be far different than what has been done before. “This is an exploratory trip to see what’s possible,” said Councilor Holly Edwards, who was anticipating going on the trip but later changed her mind because of scheduling conflicts. “I’m really being hopeful that things will work out.” The Africa-bound delegation will have about eight people, including everyone from a high school student who lives in public housing to elected officials and business leaders. The trip — from April 26 to May 4 — is also not officially a sister city delegation, officials said, but rather is being taken to explore what opportunities could come to fruition between the two cities. Elected officials are quick to point out that the trip is not being financed by city taxpayer dollars, after the backlash from the November 2007 trip to Poggio a Caiano, Italy, which was partly bolstered with public funds. Then-Mayor David Brown, schools Superintendent Rosa S. Atkins and School Board member Alvin Edwards participated. Atkins also considered going on this trip, but ultimately decided to not participate. Mayor Dave Norris, a member of the delegation, said that having Winneba be named as an official sister city is the secondary purpose of the trip. “This is more of a grassroots opportunity, where whether or not there are governmental exchanges is much lower on the priority list,” he said. “It’s really pretty powerful when you think about the fact that so many of our residents can claim West Africa as their ancestral homeland,” Norris added. “In some ways it’s being able to create an exchange program or exchange programs that are going to hopefully reconnect many residents of our community with their ancestral homeland.” But if new partnerships are formed between Charlottesville and Winneba — whether they be educational or cultural exchanges, or even business endeavors — the end result could highly resemble what the city government has already been trying to do with its three official international sister cities. Charlottesville’s sister city committee is proposed to have a $15,000 budget next year, same as the current year. Former Councilor Blake Caravati, one of the biggest pushers behind the city’s link with Besancon, France, said activity has been bustling between Charlottesville and the small locality in eastern France. Trips are being coordinated right now and Caravati said they are planning for an exchange with a large group of gospel singers from Charlottesville and Staunton to travel there. “That’s kind of the biggest thing we’re planning right now,” said Caravati, who sits on the city’s sister city committee. But starting a new venture right now could be risky because of the economy — Caravati said people do not have nearly as much disposable income to contribute to the overseas outings — and getting exchanges running regularly often takes years of effort. “It takes a long time to get these things going,” he said. “It’s not an easy thing to do, because it takes awhile and it’s a lot of hard work.” The other sister cities that have been officially proclaimed as such by the local government have seen a stagnation in activity over the last few years. Jeanne Cox, the clerk of council, wrote in an e-mail that “there haven’t been any activities on either of these in a while, unfortunately” with Poggio a Caiano and Pleven, Bulgaria, which became a sister city in 2004. City Manager Gary O’Connell said city officials were invited to Pleven on May 15 as a part of an annual celebration, but no one from Charlottesville will be attending. Two years ago, O’Connell said Pleven’s mayor came to Charlottesville as part of a United States tour, but there has not been any recent activity with the city. And with Poggio a Caiano, Charlottesville’s public schools explored establishing a student exchange program with the Tuscan city last year, but the idea was tabled. Connections have already fermented between Charlottesville and Ghana, though: Since the mid-1990s, the University of Virginia School of Medicine and the University of Ghana have had a thriving exchange program of students and faculty, and several local churches have sponsored trips to Ghana in recent years. Nana Akyeampong-Ghartey, a Winneba native and Charlottesville resident, has been one of the key pushers in getting the city to expand its exchanges with his birthplace. “Winneba has a university of education, Charlottesville has one of the best universities in the country,” he said. “On the educational front, we can strike a relationship there for both places to help each other.” But Akyeampong-Ghartey envisions a relationship that is much broader than educational connections, expanding potentially to business partnerships and cultural exchanges. “It is all a part of it,” he said. Fundraising has been done for the Winneba excursion, primarily to be able to pay for Quintin Franklyn, a public housing resident who will be filming a documentary. Norris said the money has been raised for Franklyn’s costs — the trip is estimated to be about $1,600 for airfare and hotel expenses per person — and that everyone else would be paying for the trip out of their own pockets. “When you make choices about city tax dollars, you have to put priority on making sure our roads are in decent shape and our roads are well funded, making sure we have good programs in place for our youth, etc.,” Norris said. “But this community has consistently and repeatedly stepped up to support privately funded efforts like this one. I think that says a lot about Charlottesville.” Source: dailyprogress.com