THE 18th Davao City Council on suspended rules last week gave authority to City Mayor Sara Z. Duterte-Carpio to sign a sister city agreement with the Kaua’i County.

Based on approved resolution to enact the ordinance, plans to push for this agreement started when Mayor Bernard P. Cavalho Jr. of the County of Kaua’i, State of Hawai’i last November 1, 2017 wrote a letter to Duterte-Carpio, stating his county’s invitation to establish a sister city relations to the city of Davao to promote friendship, understanding, and goodwill between the two.

On November 9, 2017, the city mayor accepted the invitation with the request that the county of Kaua’i provide a copy of the proposed sisterhood agreement.

It was on January 15, 2018, that Davao City Legal Office issued a legal opinion stating that the documents relative to the proposed sister city agreement has no legal infirmity.

In such endorsement, it was recommended to the Sangguniang Panlungsod (SP) for the grant of legislative authority.

The resolution read that the Sister City Agreement is executed to promote favorable relations of partnership and cooperation between two cities.

As stated in the agreement, partnership, exchange and development of both cities will be in the fields of tourism and culture, agriculture, and trade & commerce.

Kaua’i, based on reports, is the fourth largest of the main Hawaiian Islands and its economy was mainly tourism-driven.

This is not the first US county or city that Davao City has entered a sisterhood agreement. In 1994, Tacoma City in Washington became Davao City’s sister city.

The city also signed sister pacts with Nanning City, China; Keelung City, Taiwan; and Manado, Indonesia, among others.