Tuesday, July 25, 2000
Lockland partners with cities in Balkans
By Jennifer Mrozowski
The Cincinnati Enquirer
LOCKLAND — This blue-collar town is going global through the efforts of its village administrator.
Evonne Kovach recently traveled to Timisoara, in Western Romania, on behalf of the U.S. Agency for International Development to help that city with its economic development.
She took with her a small delegation, including Carel Vandermeyden, senior engineer, and Russell Weber, supervising engineer, both of the Cincinnati Water Works.
Timisoara and the city of Pancevo, in central Serbia, have been designated as Lockland's resource partner
cities.
Ms. Kovach had been contacted to assist both Pancevo and Timisoara in their development efforts by the International City and County Management Association, to which Ms. Kovach belongs. That agency coordinated the program through U.S. AID, Ms. Kovach said.
The organization called Ms. Kovach because of her work with brownfields, or former industrial sites that have environmental problems, and paid for her and her delegation's 10-day stay in Timisoara, she said.
In 1998, Lockland was the first municipality in Ohio to receive state funding to clean a brownfield site, Ms. Kovach said. The village has several other brownfield projects in the works.
Now Ms. Kovach is charged with using that expertise to help Pancevo and Timisoara.
“We look for this to be a long-term relationship with both cities,” Ms. Kovach said.
Pancevo will receive about $100,000 through U.S. AID to help rebuild infrastructure de stroyed during the 1999 NATO bombing campaign, the mayor of that city said. U.S. AID will receive that money from funds allocated by the U.S. Congress, Ms. Kovach said.
Srdjan Mikovic, the mayor of Pancevo and an official in the opposition Serbian Renewal Movement, said that his city was one of four in Serbia to be paired with cities in the United States.
Cities in Romania, which will help channel the funds and provide logistics, also are included in the project.
Mircea Lefchian, spokesman for Timisoara, said his city was paired with both Lockland and Pancevo, as a go-between for the Yugoslavs and the Americans.
The Clinton administration has ruled out aid to Serbia as long as Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic remains in power, and it was unclear whether the plan to funnel aid to the cities had been sanctioned.
The money is to be used over the next 18 months to repair the heating and water systems in Pancevo, which sits on the Danube River about 62 miles south of Timisoara, said Mr. Lefchian. Ti misoara is to provide utilities and other logistical help to run the program, he said.
“The Americans do not want to go themselves to Pancevo because of the regime in Belgrade, and this is why they will use us to direct the funds and complete the programs,” said Mr. Lefchian.
Cleaning the environment also is high on the list, Mr. Lefchian said, after NATO bombs hit the oil refinery in Pancevo, polluting the region.
Pancevo, Lockland and Timisoara were not partnered before the NATO campaign, but Ms. Kovach said the relationship among the three is already strong.
“These countries are halfway around the world, but all of a sudden you know them and worry about them,” she said. “They've lived very hard lives that we cannot relate to.”
Ms. Kovach said she will try to familiarize herself with the cities through three more visits, and the mayors of the two cities and some of their staff will visit Cincinnati in September.
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
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