This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.

121911Z Jul 05

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.