Thanks to the work of Redwood City International (RCI) and the Jalisco Federation of San Francisco, the City of Redwood City donated a ladder fire truck for rescue and firefighting whose aerial ladder reaches up to 30 meters high to the State Unit of Civil Protection and Firefighters of the State of Jalisco.
In an interview with Peninsula 360 Press, Connie Guerrero, a volunteer and board member of several community organizations in Redwood City - who was a member of RCI when the sister cities program, which includes Colima, Aguililla and Ciudad Guzman, began - explained that the city, when it has equipment that it will no longer use, offers it to its sister cities.
Jorge Rosales, president of the Jalisco Federation of San Francisco, which groups 28 municipalities in that Mexican state, said that in 2013, when Alicia Aguirre was mayor, Ciudad Guzmán, Jalisco, became a sister city of Redwood City.
However, the road has not been easy. Although there was a previous attempt by the Jalisco Federation and RCI to deliver a truck to the municipality of Guadalajara, this was not achieved. This is how Rosales tells it:
I was coming out of the administration and he told me: "Yes, I'll call you", and that was it. Then another administration came and the same thing happened. And once, the secretary of the Federation which I represent was in Guadalajara and looked for the state, and he went with him -he points with a gesture to Osvaldo Martinez Zavala, director of the Civil Protection and Fire Department of Jalisco- and as soon as he showed him the unit he said: "and when are we going to get it".
With nine regional bases of operation in Jalisco, the State Unit of Civil Protection and Firefighters depends on the state government and the Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Its director, Osvaldo Martínez, said they have worked in emergencies such as the earthquakes in Haiti, Ecuador and Chile, as well as in floods in Tabasco.
Two years ago, Jorge Rosales contacted me," says Martínez Zavala, "and told me about his interest in bringing emergency response units to Jalisco, which would benefit not only Civil Protection, but the Jalisco community as a whole.
On that first occasion, the Jalisco Federation, with the support of RCI, donated an air compressor truck: "there is no other in Jalisco," said Martínez Zavala. "Now we have the opportunity, thanks to Jorge, through the Federation, Connie Guerrero and RCI, to be able to bring a ladder truck for firefighting and rescue," he concluded.
The ladder truck is in very good condition. It does not fit on a trailer, so the workers of the State Unit of Civil Protection and Firefighters of Jalisco will drive it the nearly four thousand kilometers that separate Redwood City from Guadalajara, to be later transferred to Ciudad Guzmán.
Finally, Redwood City Councilman Jeff Gee said, "Through these equipment donations we honor the relationship between our cities and between our communities, because what we can do for our sister cities makes a big difference in Mexico. So I'm happy that we were able to do this."
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