About Us...
About Burlington-Alamance
Need text for here - or rearrange text we already have.
About our Sister City in Mexico
From Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soledad_de_Graciano_S%C3%A1nchez
Soledad de Graciano Sánchez, also known simply as Soledad, is the second-largest city of the state of San Luis Potosí in Mexico. It lies adjacent to the east side of the state's capital city of San Luis Potosí in the west-central part of the state. The city is the municipal seat of the municipality of the same name. The city had a 2005 census population of 215,968, while the municipality's population was 226,803. The municipality has an area of 280.95 km² (108.475 sq mi).
References
Link to tables of population data from Census of 2005 INEGI: Instituto Nacional de Estadística, Geografía e Informática.
San Luis Potosí Enciclopedia de los Municipios de México.
Ayuntamiento de Soledad de Graciano Sánchez Official Soledad city website.
HISTORY
SISTER CITIES INTERNATIONAL
On Sept. 11, 1956, then President Dwight Eisenhower founded the Sister Cities movement in response to the atrocities that he had seen during World War II. His dream was to encourage friendships on a level of people-to-people, so as to prevent global warfare from ever happening again. His emphasis even during the early days of this movement was to encourage direct interaction between private individuals, and not government employees, as the best means of founding true personal friendships.
BURLINGTON-ALAMANCE SISTER CITIES
Our local committee was formed in 1999 with the objective of founding a sister city. Various possible candidates were investigated, including ones in Moldova, Switzerland and in various parts of Mexico. On April 15, 2004, we signed an agreement of “sistering” between our mayor Steve Ross, and the mayor of Soledad, in the State of San Luis Potosi, Mexico.
THE SELECTION PROCESS
A special sub-committee of our Sister Cities board was charged with the duty of identifying criteria and developing a selection process for deciding on a Sister City. We had decided that, given current demographics, that it was important to select a sister city within Mexico. The selection criteria, as presented by Bob Byrd, were (in order):
presence of universities and colleges
the level of their commitment & excitement
access to the city by public transportation
presence of local professional and civic organizations
cultural opportunities
public safety and security
significant historical attributes
public health infrastructure
similar economic base
communication systems and connectivity
pleasant climate
prevalence of English speakers
similar population and size
desirability of physical geography
Three cities were investigated within Mexico, and by vote of the entire board, the city of Soledad was selected.
Contact us for more information.
|
