Connecting Ithaca and Pokhara
and through them, the Finger Lakes region of New York State and the Himalayan nation of Nepal
On February 2, 2022, Common Council met for the last time under Mayor Svante Myrick. On this occasion, Mayor Myrick publicly read the Pokhara-Ithaca Sister Cities Proclamation.
Mountain Legacy is initiating an array of new projects, which will be announced on this website and on Facebook. If you have suggestions, or wish to collaborate on a project that can be facilitated by this Sister Cities project, please contact Seth Sicroff at sistercities@mountainlegacy.org.
Founded by President Dwight Eisenhower in 1956, Sister Cities International is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation which serves as the national membership organization for individual sister cities. This network unites tens of thousands of citizen diplomats and volunteers in nearly 500 member communities with over 2,000 partnerships in more than 140 countries. Mountain Legacy, itself a 501(c)(3) incorporated in New York State, has taken the lead in initiating a Sister Cities link between Ithaca, a small city about 200 miles west of New York City, and Pokhara, a major city in central Nepal.
President Jimmy Carter wrote about his visits to Nepal:
This extraordinary part of the world faces many challenges. But it also has magic. As you trek through the Himalaya, I hope that you are as indelibly impressed as I have been that the people, the environment, and the culture are deserving of our attention and care.
In November 2015, after a devastating series of earthquakes, Habitat for Humanity chose Pokhara for its signature volunteer effort. Jimmy and Rosalyn Carter were delighted to take part.
In November 2018 Mayor Svante Myrick agreed to issue a Sister Cities proclamation, and Pokhara's Mayor Man Bahadur GC soon followed suit. Finally, on 11 December 2021, Mayor Myrick officially launched the program on the occasion of a Hillary Medal presentation at Southside Community Center in Ithaca. On February 2, Mayor Myrick will also read the proclamation for a television and zoom audience on the occasion of his last official participation as ex officio chair of Ithaca's Common Council.
There followed a hiatus official follow-up due to unexpected developments at the mayors' offices in both cities. In December 2023 the new mayor of Pokhara, Dhana Raj Acharya, met with Seth Sicroff and members of Pokhara's Sister City committee to discuss next steps. A letter from Mayor Acharya will be hand-delivered to Ithaca's Mayor Robert Cantelmo at the Feb. 7 meeting of the Common Council.
Mountain Legacy International and the Nepal Mountaineering Association are taking the initiative to launch a Sistier Cities relationship between Ithaca and Pokhara. Although the agreement would nominally focus on the two municipalities, the intent is to foster linkages between the regions for which they serve as gateways. Both play important roles in recreational zones, the Fingerlakes and the Annapurna Conservation Area; both are also about to expand their airports to handle international traffic, so that in effect both will be national gateways as well. In other words, we regard the Sister Cities project as a effort to foster commercial, scientic, recreational, cultural, and educational ties between Ithaca and Pokhara, the Fingerlakes and the central Himalayas, and the USA and Nepal.
Ithaca Mayor Svante Myrick's letter
Pokhara Mayor Man Bahadur GC's letter
Contact
Do you have suggestions or other feedback? Contact Mountain Legacy Projects Coordinator Seth Sicroff at sicroff@mountainlegacy.org
511 W. Green St., Ithaca NY, 14850 USA; (607) 256-0102.