A native of San Antonio, Dr. Raul (Rudy) Reyna graduated from South San High School.  He received a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering and a doctorate in educational administration from Texas A&M, and received a master’s degree in computer science from Columbia University.  His extensive career has included an executive position in a high technology firm; his twenty-eight years at SBC included working for Bell Laboratories in various design teams, management of data systems, director of SBC Online, and as president of the SBC Foundation, where he administered a $25 million budget that provided grants throughout a five state area.  He has also taught undergraduate and graduate courses in Management Information Systems as an adjunct instructor at several universities.  Currently, he is director of the San Antonio Prefreshman Engineering Program, an eight-week, mathematics-based, academic enrichment program that emphasizes the development of abstract reasoning and problem solving skills.

Last year, our Annual Mexico Trade & Cultural Mission visited this amazing city. Puebla has an incredibly rich history, and great investment opportunities for our local companies.

In this photo, our 2012 Chairman of the Board, Raúl Lomelí-Azoubel addresses the audience as we announced a Collaboration Agreement between the Municipal Government of Puebla and the San Antonio Hispanic Chamber of Commerce during our 2012 visit.

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This Summit and Expo will offer you the education, networking and hands-on training you need to grow your business in today’s economy. This year, we are also providing participants an exclusive opportunity to connect with governmental agencies and register your company to bid on key government contracts at our “Meet the Buyer” business matchmaking session; discover new business opportunities during our Business Expo.

Register before June 6th for FREE!

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CONSULATE-GENERAL OF JAPAN
909 Fannin St. Suite 3000 Houston, TX 77010

Contact: Lisa Kostelecky, Political & Economic Affairs Section
TEL: 713-652-2977 x 2107 E-MAIL: lisa.kostelecky@ho.mofa.go.jp

Conferral of the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Rosette upon Mrs. Naoko Shirane, Senior Advisor to the State of Texas

On April 29 (Japan Time), the Government of Japan announced the recipients of the 2013 Spring Imperial Decorations. Among the recipients is Mrs. Naoko Shirane, Senior Advisor to the State of Texas, who will receive the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Rosette, in recognition of her contribution to promoting friendly relations and mutual understanding between Japan and the United States.

• DECORATION: Order of the Rising Sun, Gold Rays with Rosette
• SERVICE: Contributed to promoting friendly relations and mutual understanding between Japan and the United States
• NAME: Naoko (Mitsui) Shirane
• MAJOR TITLES: 
• Founding Member, Up with People
• Board Member, Up with People, 1965-2009
• Representative of the City of San Antonio
• Senior Advisor to the State of Texas
• Senior Representative of the Texas-Japan Office
• ADDRESS (NATIONALITY): Tokyo (Japan)

Mrs. Naoko Shirane made it her life’s work to build strong international relationships between people. In 1964, she and her husband, Seiichi, became founding members of Up with People, an education organization dedicated to bridging cultural barriers through community service and music. The Shiranes were instrumental in establishing the program in Japan by building bridges with Japanese community leaders, finding Japanese program staff, setting up community services, arranging performance locations, and locating host families for the UWP young adults. Mrs. Shirane and her husband also frequently traveled to Washington D.C. to garner support among politicians and businesses for the UWP program and to promote their view of global citizenship.

In 1985, Mr. and Mrs. Shirane initiated a collaboration with San Antonio Mayor Henry Cisneros to bring San Antonio a long-term relationship with Japan after the mayor led a San Antonio and Austin delegation to Tokyo. The Shiranes were instrumental in securing Kumamoto City as a Sister City for San Antonio, and were then retained as San Antonio’s representatives in Japan. Since then, the two cities have enjoyed a model sister-city relationship, which has resulted in the establishment of a Toyota production plant in San Antonio, annual San Antonio delegations being sent to Japan, and a gift of a Japanese Garden from Kumamoto to San Antonio’s Botanical Center.

Mrs. Shirane also served as a senior advisor to the State of Texas, based in Tokyo, and cultivated many business and cultural relationships across the state. She was responsible for securing corporate sponsorship of the 1996 Sun & Star Festival, a 100-day long, large-scale Japanese cultural event held in the Dallas/Fort Worth metroplex. As Representative of San Antonio and as Senior Advisor to Texas, Naoko Shirane has supported the advance of numerous Japanese projects and events in Texas. She was awarded with the Japanese Foreign Minister’s Commendation in 2000 for her service to building international relationships, the International Person of the Year Award in San Antonio in 2006, the Japan-America Society of Houston 40th Anniversary Award in 2008, and the Japan-America Society of Dallas/Fort Worth’s Bridges to Friendship Award in 2009. In 2010, the city of San Antonio proclaimed November 14th as Naoko Shirane Day. She has been given honorary citizenship by the cities of San Antonio, Austin, Dallas, and the state of Texas. She was made Honorary Mayor of San Antonio in 2003.

For more information or if you plan to cover this event, please contact Lisa Kostelecky at 713-652-2977 x2107
-END-

Photo courtesy of The University of Texas at San Antonio

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Some Benefits of World Heritage Listing:

• The publicity that accompanies World Heritage listing and the placement of World Heritage plaques has led to increased tourism at almost all sites, often to the benefit of the economies of surrounding areas. 

• International organizations and national governments and foundations often give priority to World Heritage Sites in providing financial and technical assistance. In recent years, such sources of assistance have been quite substantial when compared to the limited amounts provided by the World Heritage Committee through the World Heritage Fund. This has happened in substantial part because World Heritage listing attests not only to the international importance of the site, but also to the commitment of the nation in which it is situated to protect it.

• Cooperative efforts to assist World Heritage Sites have not attracted nearly as much publicity as the controversial debates over how to protect a few threatened sites, but it is clear that World Heritage listings have encouraged international cooperation and assistance and outcomes beneficial to World Heritage Sites, especially at lesser known sites and in countries needing financial resources or information exchange to care for their World Heritage sites.

San Antonio and South and Central Texas are connected with Mexico by shared history, traditions and people — and connected by something else as well. Governments and policies change, but commerce has been a given throughout.

The sponsors of a new report on one nuance of this commerce give this niche a name — Texas retail as an export. Which is to say that Mexican nationals come to shop and take their purchases home.

It is a relationship that brought $2.68 billion to the region last year in shopping dollars, according to the report by the Strategic Alliance for Business and Economic Research Institute, or SABER, a collaboration of the San Antonio Hispanic Chamber of Commerce and St. Mary’s University.

That $2.68 billion is up 12.9 percent from 2011 across the 20-county region identified in the report. Bexar County alone netted about $373.9 million and nearly 4,000 jobs from the relationship. The figures, which do not include real estate buys, are calculated from VISA card purchases by Mexican nationals here and Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas data.

Though this trade has endured through governments and changed policies, this doesn’t mean that either can’t affect commerce. And this is something to keep in mind as Congress contemplates immigration reform that also includes proposals for enhanced border security.

Congress needs to guard against unintended consequences. Other sectors insulate San Antonio and Bexar County from recession more, but this report makes it clear that spending by Mexican nationals is a beneficial factor.

If nothing else, Congress can look at this report as confirmation for what Texas has long known — a border freer for commerce has immense benefits for growth on both sides.

Read more here

Every year, the Hispanic Chamber’s CORE4 STEM expo brings together more than 2,500 middle school students from five inner-city school districts to experience ways they can enhance their educational attainment through STEM.  This program is aimed to inspire San Antonio youth to explore future career interests in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM).

The San Antonio Hispanic Chamber of Commerce invests in our youth and enhances the students’ experience in STEM by hosting the CORE4 STEM Expo, because many of them will become San Antonio’s future workforce and will, one day, determine economic success.

This year, the 4^th Annual CORE4 STEM Expo is set to occur on Wednesday, November 13, 2013 and Thursday, November 14, 2013 at the Freeman Expo Hall. For more details, contact Brianna Dimas at briannad@sahcc.org or (210)208-8226.

Photos from our Press Conference:

Watch here, thanks to our friend at The Texas Tribune.

The Texas Tribune wrote:

…former U.S. Ambassador to Mexico Tony Garza assessed the still-nascent presidency of Enrique Peña Nieto and discussed lingering concerns over safety south of the border.

…talked about the efforts of Republicans — nationally and in Texas — to attract Latino voters.

&

…talked about the rationale for comprehensive immigration reform and the prospects for passage.

The students, members of the University’s International Commerce Society, were visiting San Antonio as part of an international trip to learn about transnational trade between Texas and Mexico.  

Special thanks to Diana Nevárez Magaña, Senator of the International Commerce Society, for her help and assistance in coordinating this visit.