Monday, Sept. 15, 1997 | 9:22 a.m.
Ten years is a lifetime in politics. But there won't be much fanfare in this city to mark the 10-year anniversary of Las Vegas' sister city partnership with the city of An San, Korea.
City Councilman Arnie Adamsen will travel to An San for two weeks, starting Thursday, in honor of the event. There, the city is hosting a series of cultural events in a weeklong celebration of the 10-year-old relationship.
The trip will not only be to An San, but to the Philippines, where Adamsen will sign a new sister city agreement with Angeles City. Angeles City marks the fourth sister city Las Vegas has partnered with. Phuket, Thailand, and Huludao, China, are also sister cities of Las Vegas.
Adamsen and other backers of the program contend the addition of a fourth sister city is nothing short of monumental.
"We're expanding our internationalization," Adamsen said. "Angeles City also has an international airport, gaming and a large tourism economy."
Las Vegas has relatively few sister cities when compared with other U.S. metro areas of the same size. Reno has seven sister cities, and cities such as Los Angeles and Seattle have more than 20 each.
But looming behind the rhetoric is the question of whether sister cities are relevant in today's smaller world, and what they do for the average citizen.
Noble beginnings
Started in 1956 by President Dwight Eisenhower, the sister city program was started as a way for Americans to learn about other cultures. It was the belief at the time -- before the Internet and video conferencing -- that if the average American could learn firsthand about different countries, and about the people living there, another world war could be avoided. For this reason, Japan and Germany now hold the largest number of U.S. sister city relationships than any other two countries.
Since the '50s, as the U.S. economy has become more reliant on foreign investments, sister city relationships have become viewed as financially driven rather than culturally.
The economic benefits have always been used in Las Vegas to justify sister city relationships. When former Mayor Ron Lurie started Las Vegas' partnership with An San in 1987, he touted it as a way for foreign companies to be lured into the valley and start businesses here.
In the last 10 years, two Korea-based companies, Continental Wire America Co. and Han Bo Nevada Inc., have come to the Las Vegas Valley. Another, Mercury Development, has partnered with some Nevada companies to develop a golf course and alpine village at Mount Charleston.
Adamsen expects several more businesses to be coming soon. During his trip starting this week, Adamsen estimates he will attend meetings with more than 100 Korean businessmen.
In the vein of Eisenhower's purpose, one of Las Vegas' crown jewels is its sister school program. Clark County students hold discussions via the Internet with students from An San. Some have even visited the city. And a few Korean students have attended, and graduated from, Las Vegas schools.
Aside from the student exchanges and Korean companies already here, sister city partnerships are credited with displaying the good will of Las Vegas around the globe. This eventually may lead to even more economic gains for Las Vegas, Adamsen said.
"This is how the process works in other cultures," Adamsen said. "It's all relationship-based. Now, Korea is ranked 11th in the world in GNP, and we got in on the ground floor."
In the last 10 years, only $169,000 of city funds were spent on sister city activities, according to city records. It's a veritable bargain compared with other economic programs, such as the Department of Economic Development and Assistance, which has a yearly budget of $773,000.
And though 10 years may seem a long time to get only two companies into the city, other U.S. cities say it's par for the course.
"Our relationship in the past was never perceived as something that could provide us with that big of an economic possibility," said Rita Garvey, the mayor of Clearwater, Fla., which has had a sister city relationship with the city of Nagano, Japan, since 1959.
"In 1998, for the winter Olympics in Nagano, we're going to have a 3,000-square-foot tent to show what Clearwater is like. We wouldn't have had that if it wasn't for cultivating our sister city relationship for years."
Short on results
Though sister cities were founded on a noble cause, it can't be ignored that times have changed. Understanding other cultures has become as easy as switching on a computer or turning on the television. Technology, along with the mainstreaming of overseas flight travel, has made the sister cities philosophy and practice seem almost archaic.
"We just don't have the cultural differences that we did 20 years ago," said Richard Lenz, who ran against Adamsen last year and criticized his involvement in the sister cities program. "We've become a much smaller world."
Highlighting the partnership's economic ties is one way to keep the program relevant. But the Las Vegas sister city agreement may not be nearly as profitable for the city as originally hoped. Despite Continental Wire and Han Bo leasing space at the city-owned technology park, neither one has moved in or started producing anything.
The two companies were also given better deals than American companies for their space. For instance, in 1993 Continental Wire bought eight acres of the Las Vegas Technology Center for $347,160. Six months later the Clark County Credit Union bought 3.1 acres of the same property for $607,662. Han Bo Nevada received a 7 percent interest loan from the city to buy its property at the technology center.
In defense, Adamsen said getting international businesses into the city is important for the economy because it can help the city survive in case of a recession or drop in gaming revenues. Reno, he said, has managed to diversify its economy with its sister cities and is now home to a foreign car parts distribution center.
Continental Wire's groundbreaking is planned for sometime in the next two months. Han Bo has just closed escrow here.
Adamsen's trip to An San is paid for by private donations from local businesses. Some local business executives will also be attending the festivities and meetings with Adamsen in Korea.
"We're on the go in Korea, from morning until late at night meeting with business owners," Adamsen said. "This is not a vacation."
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