Portuguese sister city in the works

GILROY
– Gilroy could soon add the Portuguese city of Angra do Heroísmo
to its list of sister cities. Located in the Azores, Mayor Al
Pinheiro’s hometown is on track to become Gilroy’s fifth
counterpart around the globe.
By Lori Stuenkel

GILROY – Gilroy could soon add the Portuguese city of Angra do Heroísmo to its list of sister cities. Located in the Azores, Mayor Al Pinheiro’s hometown is on track to become Gilroy’s fifth counterpart around the globe.

Pinheiro brought the idea to City Council last week, who authorized him to draft a letter to the mayor and city of Angra with an extension of friendship.

“It is my hometown,” Pinheiro said, explaining why he chose the port city on the southern coast of the island of Terceira. “The local Portuguese community has been around Gilroy for many years. If you go back in history, they have had many farms and dairies in the local area … I think it would be appropriate to have (a sister city) also from Portugal.”

Gilroy currently has four sister cities: Monticelli d’Ongina, Italy; Saint Clar, France; Takko-Machi, Japan; and Tecate, Baja California.

“I’ve already spoken to the mayor of (Angra), and showed him an indication that I would be interested in pursuing that, and he seemed to be very open to doing that,” Pinheiro said.

Gilroy/Angra sister-city committees will be formed both here and in Portugal once the relationship is sealed.

“Obviously, then my goal is to bring them back and have them visit Gilroy for the Garlic Festival,” Pinheiro said.

He hopes to send Gilroy delegates to Angra in 2005, for the city’s St. John’s festival, which he described as similar to the Garlic Festival.

“They have a lot of food booths and things like we do, and they have a lot of entertainment and close down the streets for folklore and things like that,” he said.

Pinheiro would also like to have a student exchange similar to the visits by Takko-Macchi students each year.

He emphasized that “absolutely no city funds” are used to pay for sister-city visits. The delegates will rely on fund raising.

Angra do Heroísmo is a city of about 35,000, the largest in the Azores archipelago, about 900 miles west of mainland Portugal.

“You hear about, especially in our area, all the Portuguese that come from the Azores,” Pinheiro said. “So it’s very appropriate to have a city in the Azores be our sister city and not one on the mainland.”