Charlottesville Sister Cities Commission AGENDA Meeting January 14, 2021 www.charlottesville.gov/zoom I. Approve Minutes (December 15, 2020) II. Presentation by Stacey Evans, a past CSCC grant recipient who visited Besancon in Fall 2019. III. Discuss steps moving forward with Huehue as Friendship City - letter for City Manager to send to representatives in Guatemala. IV. Grants Committee Update: - Outreach efforts - Grant applications received so far/possibility of extending deadline V: Update on empty CSCC positions - Council would like to extend the application period in an effort to gain a greater applicant pool. New deadline is March 5 with appointments scheduled for March 15. Upcoming Meetings: Monday, January 25: Subcommittee Meetings 4:30-5:15 Outreach & Communications, 5:15-6:00 Huehue, 6:00 - 6:45: Education, 6:45-7:30: Finance (create proposed budget) Tuesday, February 9: Grants Subcommittee Meeting Tuesday, February 16: Next CSCC Meeting Individuals with disabilities who require assistance or special arrangements to participate in the public meeting may call the ADA Coordinator at (434) 970‐3182 or submit a request via email to ada@charlottesville.gov. The City of Charlottesville requests that you provide a 48 hour notice so that proper arrangements may be made. Remote participation supported for the duration of the City Manager’s Declaration of Emergency issued March 12, 2020. Charlottesville Sister Cities Commission Meeting Minutes - December 15, 2020 Zoom Call to Order 4:34 p.m. Present: Kate Kogge, Daman Irby, Amanda Folsom, Stella Mattioli, Michael Grinnell, Adrienne Ward, Elizabeth Smiley, Dave Norris, Terri DiCintio (Past Commissioner), Maxicelia Robinson (Staff Liaison), Brian Wheeler (Communications Director) I. Approve Minutes (November 17, 2020) Motion: Grinnell; Second: Kogge Approved II. GOAL-SETTING a. Return to Goals: Committees Overview goals set for 2021 All the goals are reviewed a. Grants The grant committee decided to extend the deadline for the travel scholarship to April. The committee set the individual grant amount b. Communications/Outreach The committee worked on updating links on the website, and some links and content still need to be updated. The grant application pages are updated. One of the goals will be identifying a primary and a secondary person to take care of the websites and the social media accounts. c. Education The goals are reviewed and they are not changed d. Spanish-Speaking Sister City (note: Council approved our proposal to seek out Huehue as a “Friendship City” on Monday 12/7 -woohoo) The new sister city received positive feedback from the city council. Next steps will involve to start a stable connection between the two cities. e. Winneba Another delegation will coming this year, so this is still the main goal. The budget committee will have to meet and see if and how it is going to be possible to do the shipment of medical and school supply to Winneba. This year the tenth grader will do a project with Winneba. f. Besancon The goals are summarized and reviewed. The primary one is to establish connection with the newly appointed contact people for the sister city. Goals until number 4 will be accomplished by the end of the year. In 2021 we will try to start again the students’ exchange. There should be also a musician exchange with different events connected. A chef exchange was going to be organized; at the moment we need to understand at what point the organization work arrived. At the moment all the in person exchanges are stopped. g. Poggio a Caiano The goals are summarized and reviewed. Terri DiCintio can help in organizing a view of the Filippo Mazzei movie, and possibly enter it at the Virginia Film Festival b. Vote to approve goals - Motion: Grinnell; Second: Norris The goals are approved III. STRATEGIC PLAN a. Return to 2021-2024 Strategic Plan from last meeting - Discuss changes to plan and any concerns moving forward b. Vote to approve Strategic Plan - Motion: Irby; Second: Smiley The strategic is approved without further clarifications IV. GRANTS PROGRAM 2021 - presentation on December 1 meeting by Grants Committee a. Share Grant Application and Press Release. Some reviews and modifications are being presented, mostly on the timeline for the 2021 grant application. Some questions are asked about how is it possible to submit a grant application and about the specifics to publish the news on social media. V. STEPS MOVING FORWARD WITH HUEHUE a. Letter from City Manager to Mayor of Huehue on information about Cville along with a letter asking for “Friendship City” establishment for the next 3 years. We should act on this soon. b. “Friendship City” Committee for Huehue - will this be the same group as the Spanish-speaking City Committee (Joan, Dave, & Kate)? The objectives will be a little different now. It is explained that the city manager will have to reach out to their mayor with informations about Charlottesville. The best course of action will be to draft a letter to send to the City Manager, that will send it to Huehue. VI. QUARTERLY COMMITTEE MEETING PROPOSAL At the last retreat in September, it was noted that we might be more likely to reach our goals if we schedule subcommittee meetings. Are we in agreement with this notion, and if so, let’s make a plan for how often and when these should take place. The discussion is about organizing a meeting for every subcommittee every few months, in order to make easier to discuss and take the different decisions. The rules of the subcommittee meetings are summarized and clarified. VI. FINANCE COMMITTEE WORK SESSION TO DEVELOP BUDGET PROPOSAL FOR UPCOMING YEAR (Michael, Daman, Kate, and whoever else would like to stick around for this part). It is discussed if this should be done by our first meeting of the new year, January 19. The city manager will be invited to discuss the grant award. Adjournment 6:00 p.m. Next meeting: January 19, 2021