Fort Worth and Nagaoka, Japan, Celebrate 30 Years of Friendship

The cities couldn't be more different. Fort Worth has no mountains and no coast. Nagaoka in central Japan has both. Differences aside, they share a partnership that has been going strong for 30 years. The cities are siblings in the Fort Worth Sister Cities program.A delegation from Nagaoka came to Texas last week to celebrate the anniversary. Led by the mayor of Nagaoka, Tatsunobu Isoda, the group visited with Fort Worth City Council members and Mayor Betsy Price, toured Sundance Square and the Cultural District, attended the Japanese Fall Festival in the Fort Worth Botanic Garden and took part in an panel discussion on education at the Botanical Research Institute of Texas.They also attended a celebration dinner held in Isoda's honor Saturday at Billy Bob's Texas. The dinner included tickets to the Trace Adkins concert.A delegation from Fort Worth plans to visit Nagaoka in 2018 to continue the celebrations. For more information about the trip, call 817-632-7106 or email danielle@fwsistercities.org.Chamber awardsThe Greater Dallas Asian-American Chamber of Commerce held its annual awards luncheon Friday at the Dallas Marriott hotel in Addison. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott was the speaker. He touted the state as the "premier land of opportunity." The chamber presented him with a Swarovski crystal rooster, commemorating the year of rooster and the governor's birth in the year of the rooster.  Continue reading...