Together, we have created the 'US-Cuba Sister Cities Association' to serve a primary purpose: to help in establishing meaningful, long term, and sustainable relationships, with our counterparts in Cuba. That means we are 'in it' for the long haul; the 'thick & thin' with our friends there.

Given unsettling reports of the extreme nature of hurricane damage, USCSCA is sending members from our executive committee to Cuba to assess the damage firsthand, and discuss with Cuba the ways in which our communities might be most useful in collecting humanitarian aid and planning our future exchange programs. Our team will bring a first hand report back to you, with an emphasis on how we, in sister cities, can be most constructive in our assistance, both locally and nationally. But it would seem that recovery assistance may need to be a factor in all of our efforts for some time to come.

Cuban President, Fidel Castro, has said the damage from Hurricane Michelle is the worst natural disaster to strike Cuba for over 100 years. Some witnesses have suggested that is an understatement of the storm's severity.

It is difficult for those of us who know what Cuba has stoically endured for the past forty years, to imagine this, perhaps even more extreme hardship, and the resulting challenges they may be facing.

It has prompted Cuba to request from the US government the right to purchase 30 million dollars in essential foods and medicines for immediate needs since Cuba had to 'politely' refuse 'charity' donations from the US government, that were conditioned to exempt and undermine the Cuban government from its ability to meet its responsibilities to respond to emergency distribution.

As you are aware, USCSCA is scheduled to have its next conference in Cuba the week of February 17-24th. That would be a time where people from your community group can meet with your provincial partners, and determine the specific programs you would like to promote. It will also be a time for Cuba to express its developmental needs which could give us ideas to bring home and engage new sectors of our communities in our work. (Construction delegations?) Please mark the dates on your calendars for this crucial meeting. Information will be forthcoming after the delegation returns December 10th.

In the meantime, financial contributions being collected by USCSCA for hurricane relief have exceeded $1,000 so far, and we expect once people know better what we are dealing with, will continue as an ongoing fund to help as long as the emergency exists.

Sincerely,

Lisa Valanti

President
US-CUBA Sister Cities Association, Inc.

National Office:
320 Lowenhill Street
Pittsburgh, PA 15216
412-563-1519
Fax: 412-563-1915

Email: USCSCA@aol.com
Website: www.USCSCA.org

Cienfuegos along with Matanzas, was one of the hardest hit provinces by Hurricane Michelle.

The damage is catastrophic, and much of Cuba's infrastructure and food crops are damaged beyond salvation. Thousands have lost their homes, and basic food delivery will be challenging.

Because communication lines are down, as well as electric, gas, water, fuel, TV, radio, etc., are impacted, we still haven't got an exact idea of extent of the devastation. We do know it caused as much, if not more damage in 15 hours than forty years of the U.S. embargo.

USCSCA is asking all sister cities to organize humanitarian delegations to go to Cuba the week of February 17th-24th for a meeting to assess hurricane damage, and determine, with our Cuban counterparts, how our sister city relationships can best help with the long reconstruction process the Cuban people are faced with.

It would be appropriate for city officials, or their representatives, to lead these delegations and be part of the discussions on how our communities can best work together in partnership. Please contact USCSCA for details on this nationwide initiative to help Cuba with on-site interactive discussions.

We are also collecting donations, tax deductible checks should be made to "USCSCA" and marked 'hurricane relief' and mailed to the address below. All donations will be given to Cuba, without conditions, for the food and medicine focusing on the immediate needs of children, which Cuba has prioritized.

If people have or can secure large quantities of medication or food, it may be possible to get it shipped to Cuba as part of the national efforts to respond to this crisis. Please contact the national office to find the best method for your city.

This is when our efforts are essential in the support of our friends in Cuba. We are not impartial observers, we are direct and constant participants in solidarity with the Cuban people to make a better world for all. We know it is hard to imagine the emergency, but we hope that you will organize a city or regional delegation see it for yourself, and engage others to do the same, and convey the needs of the Cuban people to your community.

Lastly, Cuba has requested that it be able to meet its immediate needs by purchasing food and medicine directly from the US, since it is so close.

This is when the inhumanity of U.S. policy and the continuing blockade is most evident and unacceptable.

Please call ALL your representatives, local city, state, federal and ask them to advocate with the administration, that Cuba's request be honored, with utmost expediency. As much as sometimes we think we are ignored, these calls, coming from throughout the U.S. give constituent force and demonstrate majority goodwill and interest by the public, and may prove essential to make it possible for the administration to grant Cuba's modest request.

Sincerely,

Lisa Valanti
President
US-CUBA Sister Cities Association, Inc.

National Office:
320 Lowenhill Street
Pittsburgh, PA 15216

412-563-1519
Fax: 412-563-1915
Email: USCSCA@aol.com
Website: www.USCSCA.org

We have been in touch with Cuba through the Cuban Interests Section, and the damage being reported from Hurricane Michelle, in some cases, is an understatement. The damage is profound, and the recovery will be long term and ongoing, a whole other 'special period.'

However, Cuba is keenly aware that they are better able to deal with the long term demands of recovery because they work collectively together as a nation towards the same ends, thanks to the Revolution, and thus are not 'left to their individual luck' like people's from other areas of the world which have no control over any of their national resources, including human resources, and are thus totally dependent on charity to survive.

So Cuba is not requesting formal international aid at this time, and will only accept offers of solidarity and friendship, but has requested that all contributions be geared towards children -- food and pediatric medicines, and all financial contributions will be used towards those purposes.

In the province of Matanzas alone, over 500 schools have suffered damage, and over 10,000 homes. Adults will be very busy trying to reclaim the damage in cane, tobacco, citrus, and other essential food crops. Matanzas is called the 'breadbasket of Cuba" because it produces a large percentage of food used for domestic consumption.

Cuba is still unable to buy food or medicine unencumbered, as a result of U.S. policy, so importing prices are high for them as they must pay very expensive shipping and transportation expenses. With the damage to the sugar, tobacco and citrus crops, and the drop in tourism after Sept. 11, hard currency will be an ever bigger problem.

USCSCA will accept financial contributions, made out to 'US-Cuba Sister Cities Association,' with "Cuba Hurricane Relief" written in the memo section of the check. Please mail to the address listed below. We are also discussing with an east coast and west coast humanitarian/medical aid partners, the possibility of doing a food and medicine drive for the children of Cuba, depending on the response we get from different cities and our membership.

We also recommend that everyone put together a humanitarian aid delegation, led by or including their City officials, to go to Cuba the week of February 17-24, to tour the damage in areas where your partnership/sister city is, or will be. We are trying to have people working on sister cities and exchanges, in Cuba at the same time, so that Cuba can address the issue as a whole, as well as provincially.

Please take this up with your membership, and other non-membership community groups and concerned individuals. (Churches, markets, food co-ops, schools, businesses) This is an example of how the individual efforts that many organizations want to make, can work better together, under the umbrella of sister cities.

This is when our community-to-community relations really count, and why we organize as sister cities; we are in it with our Cuban neighbors for the long haul! The USCSCA conference (February 18-19) will continue the conversation we are having on how to improve and expedite our people-to-people programs, and the rest of the week will be onsite with local community leaders who will share with us the challenges ahead.

FYI some initial reports of the damage:

Cuba power out post-Michelle, millions need food
By Andrew Cawthorne

HAVANA, Nov 6 (Reuters) - Large areas of Cuba were still in the dark on Tuesday and millions were short of food two days after Hurricane Michelle charged at the Caribbean island, destroying crops and homes, and killing at least five people.

"We survived!" an anxious but upbeat President Fidel Castro said as he criss-crossed the worst-affected central western provinces of Matanzas, Villa Clara and Cienfuegos to see the damage of Cuba's worst storm in half a century.

Electricity was gradually returning to some zones early on Tuesday, but most of Cuba -- including Havana -- passed a second night of darkness, with residents relying on candles and gas-lights, and some cooking over wooden fires in the streets.

"It wasn't like this even in the 'Special Period'," said Irma Gonzalez, carrying a plate of food to an elderly neighbor in the sea-front Miramar district of Havana. She was referring to Cuba's term for its economic crisis in the 1990s after the Soviet collapse, when blackouts and food shortages were common.

Communications across Cuba were still limited, but a picture of widespread destruction was emerging, especially to some localities where Michelle's eye passed over and to the economically important sugar, citrus and coffee crops.

Reuters TV images showed scores of wooden houses razed to the ground, and residents carrying belongings through water up to their chests in the town of Jaguey Grande, in Matanzas, which took one of the worst beatings.

MICHELLE SPARED ITS WORST

Michelle strengthened to a Category 4 hurricane, termed "extremely dangerous," before it hit Cuba. As a weaker storm before reaching the Caribbean's largest island, it had killed 10 and made thousands homeless in Central America.

Cuba's Civil Defense said four of the five victims on the island had died from collapsed buildings, while the fifth drowned at Playa Larga, on the Bay of Pigs, where Michelle entered and Cuba defeated a U.S.-backed invasion in 1961.

Michelle's winds of up to 135 mph (217 kph) and torrential rain tore down thousands of houses, flattened sugarcane fields, and damaged tourist facilities in the worst-affected areas.

Castro said it was too early, however, to quantify damage, and that anyway was a capitalist concept he did not like. "You can't measure damage by volume, by cost, that's capitalism," the communist leader told reporters.

Despite that, authorities did appear to be meticulously counting the damage, even giving the exact number and percentage of trees felled in Havana, for example.

During the hurricane, nearly 800,000 people -- or 1 in 14 Cubans -- were evacuated to shelters. They began gradually returning home on Monday. 09:43 11-06-01

----------------------------

See you in Cuba, February 17-24, 2002!

 "How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world!" Anne Frank.

On behalf of our officers and board,

Sincerely,

Lisa Valanti
President
US-CUBA Sister Cities Association, Inc.

As most of you are aware, Hurricane Michelle hit Cuba, the most damaging storm since 1944, claiming at least five lives, destroying thousands of homes and creating severe potable water and food emergencies. The provinces suffering the most damage were Matanzas, Villa Clara, Cienfuegos and Havana, although the entire island will be impacted by severe crop damage in sugar, citrus and coffee.

USCSCA is recommending that sister cities (and cities in formation) put together diverse community Humanitarian Aid delegations to go to Cuba the week of February 17-24th, to participate in the USCSCA conference (2 days) and tour your sister city/province to inspect the hurricane damage and research and investigate how you can best create or assist in some sort of restoration project or help in sustaining some sort of people-to-people project that will aid the Cubans in the months ahead as they struggle to recover from this devastating storm.

This is when our community-to-community relations really count, we are in it with our Cuban neighbors for the long haul! The USCSCA conference (February 18-19) will continue the conversation we are having on how to improve and expedite our people-to-people programs, and the rest of the week will be on-site with local community leaders who will share with us the challenges ahead.

USCSCA is also accepting tax-deductible donations, made out to USCSCA, which will be turned over to an appropriate agency (we are researching the best way -- International Red Cross, Pan American World Health Organization, Global Links, Operation USA or one of our European partners, etc.) for hurricane relief. Please write "Cuba Hurricane relief" on the memo line of your check, and send to the national office, address below.

FYI some initial reports of the damage:

Cuba power out post-Michelle, millions need food
By Andrew Cawthorne

HAVANA, Nov 6 (Reuters) - Large areas of Cuba were still in the dark on Tuesday and millions were short of food two days after Hurricane Michelle charged at the Caribbean island, destroying crops and homes, and killing at least five people.

"We survived!" an anxious but upbeat President Fidel Castro said as he criss-crossed the worst-affected central western provinces of Matanzas, Villa Clara and Cienfuegos to see the damage of Cuba's worst storm in half a century.

Electricity was gradually returning to some zones early on Tuesday, but most of Cuba -- including Havana -- passed a second night of darkness, with residents relying on candles and gas-lights, and some cooking over wooden fires in the streets.

"It wasn't like this even in the 'Special Period'," said Irma Gonzalez, carrying a plate of food to an elderly neighbor in the sea-front Miramar district of Havana. She was referring to Cuba's term for its economic crisis in the 1990s after the Soviet collapse, when blackouts and food shortages were common.

Communications across Cuba were still limited, but a picture of widespread destruction was emerging, especially to some localities where Michelle's eye passed over and to the economically important sugar, citrus and coffee crops.

Reuters TV images showed scores of wooden houses razed to the ground, and residents carrying belongings through water up to their chests in the town of Jaguey Grande, in Matanzas, which took one of the worst beatings.

MICHELLE SPARED ITS WORST

Michelle strengthened to a Category 4 hurricane, termed "extremely dangerous," before it hit Cuba. As a weaker storm before reaching the Caribbean's largest island, it had killed 10 and made thousands homeless in Central America.

Cuba's Civil Defense said four of the five victims on the island had died from collapsed buildings, while the fifth drowned at Playa Larga, on the Bay of Pigs, where Michelle entered and Cuba defeated a U.S.-backed invasion in 1961.

Michelle's winds of up to 135 mph (217 kph) and torrential rain tore down thousands of houses, flattened sugarcane fields, and damaged tourist facilities in the worst-affected areas.

Castro said it was too early, however, to quantify damage, and that anyway was a capitalist concept he did not like. "You can't measure damage by volume, by cost, that's capitalism," the communist leader told reporters.

Despite that, authorities did appear to be meticulously counting the damage, even giving the exact number and percentage of trees felled in Havana, for example.

During the hurricane, nearly 800,000 people -- or 1 in 14 Cubans -- were evacuated to shelters. They began gradually returning home on Monday. 09:43 11-06-01

..............................................................

See you in Cuba, February 17-24, 2002!

 "How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world!" Anne Frank.

On behalf of our officers and board,

Sincerely,

Lisa Valanti
President
US-CUBA Sister Cities Association, Inc.