Arcadia officials’ China field trip

Updated Feb. 17, 2015: Arcadia city officials will spend nearly two weeks observing, absorbing, and learning about Chinese and Taiwanese culture and even authentic, original night markets first-hand when they travel to Taiwan, mainland China, and Hong Kong from March 18 – April 1. This isn’t just elected City Council Members — three of the five of them are going — but also City Manager Dominic Lazzaretto, Fire Chief Kurt Norwood, Public Works Director Tom Tait, Recreation and Community Services Director Sara Somogyi, and even City Attorney Stephen Deitsch. The trip will cost the City and Arcadia taxpayers almost nothing. “We wanted to put a trip together to China and Taiwan to understand how they operate their government,” Mayor John Wuo told Arcadia’s Best Friday, Feb. 13, 2015. He said they will learn about everything from how they treat their water to how they get fire trucks into narrow alleys. Most importantly, he says, they will learn the culture.

Scott Hettrick

The benefits to these officials and thus the City of Arcadia is invaluable and long overdue. My trips to mainland China through a company coordinated by the Arcadia Chamber of Commerce in 2007 and later to Beijing, Shanghai and Seoul South Korea in November 2012 with a delegation of the International 3D Society were enormously illuminating and gave me a completely new and beneficial perspective on the culture that I did not have and could not have attained even through years of close friendships I have with Chinese-Americans here in Arcadia. The same was true with an eye-opening trip I made to Japan in 2009, where I learned more about their culture and lifestyle in a week than I had learned from my wife who had lived there for two years, from my cousin who has lived there for 25 years, or his adopted teenage daughter who lived with us in Arcadia for a year.

“As the Chinese say, ‘One can learn more by walking ten thousand miles than reading ten thousand books,’ ” former Arcadia Chinese Association President Edward Wong told Arcadia’s Best. “By… talking to the local people there, one can learn much more about the Chinese custom and culture. This will lead to better understanding of their reasoning and cause of their behavior, such as those who immigrated here to Southern California.” “With this experience I hope to broaden my knowledge to better serve the community in the future,” says Somogyi, who is tasked with providing recreation and community services to a community whose population is now (update: 60% Asian overall, with 45% Chinese-American according to a 2013 Census estimate, and about two-thirds of all public school students, according to school officials). “I think this is a fantastic idea!,” says current ACA President Francine Chiu. “Such a visit will facilitate the understanding of the culture of Chinese people…  I’m sure this understanding of cultural differences will bring harmony to the city in all aspects.” “I’m interested… to experience the culture and history of the country of many of the citizens we service in Arcadia,” says Fire Chief Norwood. “I hope to gain a better understanding and perspective of the Chinese community.” He is also looking forward to hearing about how Chinese deal with delivery of fire services in various situations that may be applicable here, as well as sharing information about his own experiences that may be helpful to them.

Funding of expenses for Arcadia city officials and family members

As for the funding of the trip, although many other cities in San Gabriel Valley and throughout Los Angeles send officials to China regularly, and usually have almost all costs underwritten by Chinese governmental agencies or corporations — guided tour trips to China through Chambers of Commerce are also largely subsidized or greatly discounted by Chinese tourism agencies (Update: I learned this week that Arcadia school principals make subsidized trips to China each year for this same purpose, to get better first-hand understanding of the nuances of the culture to provide more effective teaching of students.) — Arcadia officials want to minimize such donations and contributions.

“Our city has much higher standards,” Mayor Wuo said. “We want to make sure we do everything properly. Maybe we do more than we need to.” The Mayor and City Council will be asked to approve the City staff’s proposed plan for the trip at the regular City Council meeting Tuesday night, Feb. 17. (update: After only one public comment offered questioning the use money from donor companies to partially fund the trip, the Council voted unanimously to approve the trip.)

Two companies based in China that were contacted by Mayor John Wuo have each donated $10,000 in January to help cover expenses for the trip. (Wuo and others may also solicit and receive additional donations before and during the trip. – Update: plus a third company that donated another $10,000 last weekend and there may be a fourth donor yet to come, Lazzaretto announced at the Feb. 17 City Council meeting.) A Chinese visitors agency — Chinese People’s Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries — will cover ground transportation costs and most likely provide a translator. (Mayor Wuo and Council Member Sho Tay and their wives speak Chinese but cannot be expected to serve as translators 24/7 for the entire group on the trip.) The staff report to be presented Tuesday says the delegation may also receive and accept offers during the trip from companies offering to cover some expenses. All expenses of family members of City Council Members will be paid on their own without any City funds — spouses of Mayor Wuo and Sho Tay, and Wuo’s brother and his wife. Council Member Tom Beck’s wife will not be going along. Council Member Roger Chandler opted not to go. Mayor Pro Tem Gary Kovacic had a scheduling conflict next month but he traveled to China several years ago with a delegation of mayors from several prominent Los Angeles County cities along with County Supervisor Don Knabe on a trip coordinated by the mayor of Manhattan Beach. “I found the trip to be extremely helpful…,” Kovacic told Arcadia’s Best. “It gave me a great opportunity to see community life first-hand in cities that once were the hometowns for many of our current Arcadia residents…”

The three Council Members will cover most of their own expenses as well, with only $450 from each of the two $10,000 donations from the Chinese companies — E-waste recycling company Sichuan Arrow Recovery Tech Co. Ltd in Chengdu, Schuan, China; and Macao-based international trading company Companhia De Domercial Dingyuan Limitada (update: plus the third $10,000 donation from Perfect Brothers Development Corp., based in Rowland Heights) — being applied to the expenses of each Council Member (update: $1,350 and potentially $1,800 total for each of the three Council Members). This is to comply in the strictest possible way to laws regulating donations to City officials to a maximum value of $460 per gift, according to Lazzaretto. Just as the quid pro quo for most subsidized trips involve some sort of meeting with local officials or tour of the factories helping to fund the visits, Lazzaretto and Mayor Wuo acknowledged that the Arcadia delegation will meet at some point with representatives of the China-based companies that donated $10,000 each. According to the staff report for Tuesday’s meeting, “one or more owners of each of the two companies may have interests in real estate and development companies in the San Gabriel Valley that may operate in the City of Arcadia.” Whether or not there winds up being any direct or indirect business connection for those companies to potentially establish with Arcadia, there may be some discussion with officials in one or more cities visited by the Arcadia delegation about establishing an informal sister city relationship. This allows for justification of City expenditures on a trip like this. Unlike the more formal Sister Cities International program that requires official proclamations and certain criteria to be met, something Arcadia hasn’t done for decades since formally designating Tripolis, Greece and Newcastle, Australia as Sister Cities (thus, two of the city’s parks carry these names), an informal relationship involves little more than perhaps exchanging some small gifts and staying in touch periodically, according to Lazzaretto. City staff recently learned to their surprise that the city of Taixing, China already considers the City of Arcadia to be its sister city, perhaps an informal agreement offered by a former Council Member or Mayor. The Arcadia delegation will travel to Taixing for governmental office tours and official meetings and may wish to substantiate this relationship. In addition, Lazzaretto said the Neihu District of Taipei City has expressed interest in becoming a sister city. Thus, that will be one of the official visits on the itinerary, a lunch with the foreign minister and a tour of their facilities and their water and fire departments, etc.

“Touring the cities in China will broaden our knowledge of their infrastructure,” Public Works Services Director Tom Tait told Arcadia’s Best.

The City chose to put the combined $20,000 of donations by the Chinese companies (update: $30,000 and potentially $40,000 overall) in to the City’s General Fund so that it can technically be used for any City expense and thus is not subject to regulations about donations for elected officials. But the decision was made to have Council Members adhere to the donation limitation anyway to avoid any appearance or perception of impropriety.

“We thought it was important enough to go (to China) that we wanted to pay for it ourselves,” City Manager Lazzaretto told Arcadia’s Best Friday. “Since we are not going for business or economic development relationship reasons, but rather going for cultural and knowledge-based reasons, we wanted to be as above-board as possible.”

The decision will limit the three elected Council Members combined to be compensated no more than $2,700 of the $20,000 in donations (update: $4,050 of the $30,000 and potentially $5,400 of the $40,000). The rest — about $17,300 (update: $25,950 or $34,600) — will be applied towards the airfare (all will be flying coach class in accordance with City policy), hotels, meals, and other City business-related expenses of the other department heads and City Attorney. Lazzaretto estimates those costs (roughly 60% – 70% for each individual’s estimated overall expenses of $6,000 each) will probably come to about $22,700.

Any personal off-itinerary travel along the way, as well as personal expenses, will be covered by each individual. Tourist-oriented visits to places such as the Great Wall of China, the Terra-cotta warriors, China’s tallest skyscraper the Shanghai Tower, the groundbreaking Taipei 101 skyscraper, the National Palace Museum in Taipei, the night markets that spawned Arcadia’s 626 Night Markets, and a bullet train or two, are being encouraged in order to absorb as much of the culture, history, and technological achievements as possible.

Origins and evolution of idea for trip to China

City officials began discussing the China trip last fall at the suggestion of Mayor Wuo, who left Taiwan while in high school in 1966. He didn’t return until 1974 when he and his wife Jane were married there. These days he makes a couple trips to mainland China each year but doesn’t get back to Taiwan much. Although never close friends, Mayor Wuo attended the same school at the same time as Ma Ying-jeou, who is now President of the Republic of China, the official name of the area of China commonly known as Taiwan. Since “Ma” became President in 2008, Wuo has contacted him to let him know that the Mayor still remembered the number he was assigned as a school student, something not many remember long afterwards, let alone half a century later. To his amusement, President “Ma” told Mayor Wuo that he too remembered his student ID number.

The City staff report for Tuesday’s City Council meeting says the group visiting China could use the $20,000 towards creating a potential “sister city relationship” and to “study the nature of local governmental services, including land use planning, code enforcement, emergency services, residential design, and other relevant city services.”

Lazzaretto pointed out that the cities chosen to visit — Taipei City, Beijing, Xian, Shanghai, Hangzhou, Suzhou, Taixing, and Hong Kong — represent a variety of the most prominent cultural segments within China, including areas where various dialects of Mandarin is spoken, and others such as Hong Kong where Cantonese is the primary language. Just as there are extreme differences in culture from Mississippi to New York City in the United States, the same is true in China. And Chinese immigrants in Arcadia represent much of that diversity, so it’s important for officials to understand those distinctions. “We tend to see China as monolitihic but there is a lot of difference between Beijing, Shanghai, Taipei City and Hong Kong,” Lazzaretto said.

In addition to Neihu District of Taipei City, there will be similar official visits in mainland China – Arcadia city officials worked with the China embassy in Los Angeles. Taiwan has no diplomatic relationship with the United States so Arcadia officials worked with the Taiwanese culture center and economic office.

Perception is everything

Although the City Council now has two Chinese-Americans — the most ever at one time — none of the City’s top administrators and few others on staff live in Arcadia, and most department heads are not Chinese, with only one exception. Thus, it will be that much more beneficial for these officials who are managing services for our community to experience first-hand the culture from which most of our residents immigrated themselves, continue to immigrate, or from where their parents and grandparents immigrated. This is not turning Arcadia into China, and it does not suggest that immigrants should not learn and adapt the ways of their adopted country. It is simply a recognition of reality and making the best of that situation. All community services, from recreation to fire and police, must adequately address the needs of all our residents. The more welcome everyone feels, the more likely we are to feel comfortable enough with each other and integrate more quickly. One of the big take-aways for me on my first trip to China was seeing an entire crowded population of people who do not observe what we consider a respectable amount of personal space in this country. Standing in queues in Tiananmen Square to see the glass tomb of Mao Zedong and pretty much anywhere else I went, the locals were constantly bumping into my back and sometimes cutting in line. I noticed them doing this with each other as well. While I still find it annoying, I instantly developed a far greater tolerance for this behavior back home. Similarly, I observed the way locals interact with police and any government officials. I experienced what and how they eat in their homes and at restaurants and how they behave with each other in public and private, all of which altered for the better my understanding and the way I interact with Chinese-Americans here in my town. I would love for every Caucasian resident of Arcadia to have the same experience. I’d even be fine to have it all paid for by Chinese government agencies and companies. City officials making the effort to gain a first-hand experience in China is the next best thing, and certainly a great start.

“That’s exactly why we’re doing this,” Mayor Wuo says. “It’s those little things that make all the difference. Once you’ve been there you can see why they behave the way they do. It’s beneficial for the City Council and for the staff who works here to understand that culture.”

— By Scott Hettrick