FY 2005 IVLP EVALUATION: LUCI GRECHEN; FEBRUARY 7-25,

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 OTTAWA 002106 SIPDIS STATE FOR ECA/PE/V/R/W - EWILKES-SCOTT STATE FOR WHA/PDA - JANE CARPENTER-ROCK STATE FOR WHA/CAN - TERRY BREESE STATE FOR EB/ESC/IEC/EPC - PEDRO ERVITI STATE FOR WHA/AND - LISA SCHREIBER-HUGHES USDA FOR HELEN STANARD USDOC FOR ANDREW RUDMAN STATE PASS EPA FOR PETE CHRISTICH APP WINNIPEG MESSAGE 2005/05 E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: OEXC PREL CA IV SUBJECT: FY 2005 IVLP EVALUATION: LUCI GRECHEN; FEBRUARY 7-25, 2005; STATE AND LOCAL GOVERNMENTS Refs: (A) STATE 6971 (B) STATE 188247 (C) OTTAWA 2290 ¶1. Summary: Program evaluation for International Visitor Leadership Program grantee Luci Grechen. End summary. ¶2. MPP Theme Addressed: Open Markets, Mutual Understanding. Strategic Goal: Economic Prosperity. ¶3. Post Objectives: -- Learning about the U.S. federal system of government - overview of federalism; the relationship of states to the federal government; state-to-state relations; Canada-U.S. relations -- Developing an understanding of the roles and responsibilities of the federal and state governments in areas of shared jurisdiction including healthcare, energy, and agriculture. -- Understanding the federal-state relationship on environmental issues - specifically how environmental policy is developed and enforced in the context of Manitoba's ongoing disputes with North Dakota over water issues (Devils Lake and the Northwest Area Water Supply initiative). Specific topics might include water quality, the interbasin transfer of invasive species and foreign biota. ¶4. Results: Luci Grechen gave generally a positive review to her IVP, especially for the broadened perspective it gave her on the United States, its land and its people. She found it beneficial to learn about U.S. federalism in theory in Washington through academic briefings and with federal agencies, and then to see how it worked in practice in cities and states. Seeing how policy is developed in the U.S. federalist system - which differs significantly from Canadian parliamentary federalism - was a real eye-opener to Grechen, who saw the importance of building consensus and the role of process in building consensus on several issues that have an effect on Manitoba. In planning Grechen's program, we anticipated that her study of policy-making might focus more on environmental issues, specifically the contentious Devils Lake outlet proposal. Grechen indicated on her return that she learned more about policy-making in the context of the debate over the re-opening of the border to imports of live cattle from Canada since the discovery of BSE. This is also an important issue to Manitoba - and one that Grechen knows well - and it provided an equivalent opportunity to see how policy is developed in the United States. She learned about the wide assortment of players in that debate in the United States including the administration, congress, industry groups for and against the proposal, and the role of the Courts in arbitrating specific legal questions. She met in person with several of the key agencies and lobbyists. Referring to the administration's support for opening the border to live cattle, a question we hear often from Canadians is: "If the President wants to open the border to our cattle, why doesn't he just open it?" As Grechen now knows, there is much more to the process and she understands how it differs from the policy-making process in Canada. She can also extrapolate the knowledge she gained about the policy-making process on the BSE issue to other issues that affect Manitoba, such as the Devils Lake diversion case and softwood lumber. The opportunity for Grechen to meet with Americans from a wide variety of geographically, economically and professional backgrounds gave her a better understanding for the diverse interests within the United States that must be accommodated in the policy-making process, and how that is accomplished. As Grechen noted in the follow-up interview, "the decision-making process in the U.S. isn't a straight line. Decisions don't always go the way you think they will, as so many people have input, and there is so much competition between all these competing bodies." She noted that coalitions - sometimes very unlikely and temporary alliances - will form around issues, and personal relations also play an important role in the legislative process. This contrasts with Canadian federalism, which tends to be more ideological, and party discipline is much tighter, resulting in most legislative proceedings being a foregone conclusion. Grechen found the Washington meetings useful in getting a national perspective on federalism and many of issues she would be exploring in more depth later in her program. She specifically mentioned the "Intro to the U.S." seminar at Georgetown University as providing her a useful overview on the United States. There were a few minor "cock-ups" on meetings, such as an office that had moved, and several cases of offices scrambling when she arrived. She expects that many of the meetings were scheduled quite a while in advance, and suggested that perhaps this could be remedied by program organizers re- confirming meetings shortly before her arrival. Fortunately, her schedule was never that busy, so she was always able to accommodate. She noted that she did find the USDA meeting too long - it ran for a full morning - although she found the handout materials very useful. The meeting with EPA's Pete Christich was quite useful to her in understanding the water issues, although she found that his message was quite tightly scripted and she got the impression he was not being as candid as he would like. Grechen described her program in Washington and in the other cities as "leisurely", often with a lot of time between meetings. On a typical day she would have meetings at 10:00 and 3:00, leaving her downtown most of the day in full business attire. She was a little overdressed to go sightseeing - which she did anyways - but did not have enough time to go back to the hotel and change. Her preference would be either for a busier schedule that would keep her fully occupied, or pushing her business appointments into a block during the morning or afternoon to leave her larger blocks of time to explore her own interests. Grechen has an excellent series of meetings in Kansas City, and indicated that some of the contacts she made there have already proven very useful. She has been in touch with a contact in the KC mayor's office already, and officials from the Manitoba Government will be visiting Kansas City this year to pursue economic and trade relations. The home hospitality in Kansas City went well. Her host made her feel very welcome, and gave her an excellent overview of the city, although Grechen noted she was a bit critical of some of her fellow Kansas City residents. Grechen also found the meeting with the academic in Kansas City very useful. He gave an excellent explanation of local government structure, and left her with a strong sense of the overlapping nature of the many elected councils, boards and other officials, and the dispersive nature of that structure on policy- making. Grechen found KC somewhat difficult to get around because of the distance between meetings. Grechen offered few thoughts on her Austin program, despite being there for nearly a week. She noted her meeting with Buddy Garcia in the TX Governor's office as one of the least useful of her visit. It lasted only 15 minutes, and he seemed distracted throughout. Prior to leaving for her program, Grechen had relatively low expectations for Springfield, the last city she visited. It was a compromise choice after several other cities she had requested turned out not to be available. Her expectations were even lower as she arrived, tired after two weeks of constant traveling and without much idea of what to expect in Springfield. Grechen was pleasantly surprised when Springfield turned out to be the highlight of her visit. Her exact words were "Springfield was fabulous!" The meetings were interesting and useful, including a valuable session with the pharmacists association that gave her a good sense of their perspective on the Internet Pharmacy issue - an important issue in Manitoba, and she found state agriculture officials very keen to establish a relationship with Manitoba. The agriculture officials also extended thru Grechen an invitation for Manitoba officials to attend an agriculture economics summit they are holding, and she is hopeful that representatives from Manitoba will attend. Grechen also developed a good rapport with "Katie" - her host in Springfield - who Grechen described as giving her "personalized treatment" and really made her feel at home. Katie was also instrumental in conveying to Grechen the depth of love Americans have for their country. Even though they may disagree or protest, American patriotism and national symbols unite citizens and transcend individual issues. Grechen's IVLP experience was overwhelmingly positive and she thanked the Consulate, Embassy and ECA/PE/V/R/W for making this once-in-a-lifetime experience possible. The experience gave her a new and enhanced perspective on the United States and the policy process that will benefit her personally and professionally for years to come. This is particularly useful to Post, since Grechen is the point person on Manitoba's significant political and economic relationship with the United States. We are confident in calling on Grechen in future that her IVLP has sensitized her to U.S. concerns and the slow nature of the U.S. policy-making process. Although her program was excellent, Grechen said that she would have found it easier to settle in to each city if there had been a "mentor" to help her familiarize herself. The mentor could be a volunteer who meets the participant at the airport, takes them on a windshield tour of the city, and generally acquaints them with the city's history and atmosphere. On accommodations, she was quite satisfied with the quality of all of the hotels she stayed in, but apparently one of the hotels did not offer room service. Grechen noted that there were a couple of nights where she was tired at the end of a long day and she could have made use of the room service option. She was also surprised at being asked to make an impromptu presentation to an African-American lobby group. Grechen is uncomfortable at public speaking even when prepared, and specifically asked not to make any presentations during her program. She went into the meeting expecting them to make a presentation to her, but instead she faced a group of 40 people who were expecting her to make a presentation to them. Her presentation on Manitoba was quite brief, and the meeting changed into more of an open dialogue, which is a more comfortable format for Grechen. ¶5. APP WINNIPEG SENDS.