Elk Grove Village has a new international partner. A delegation from Pernik, Bulgaria, attended Tuesday’s (Nov. 13) village board meeting to sign a friendship agreement — the first step toward a formal sister city agreement.
Signing the agreement with Mayor Craig Johnson was Pernik Mayor Vyara Tserovska. The Bulgarian delegation at Tuesday’s meeting included Pernik’s deputy mayor, the mayor of a suburb of Pernik, other Pernik municipal officials, the Bulgarian consul general in Chicago and officials with the Bulgarian American Heritage Center.
Several Pernik officials wore T-shirts incorporating the Elk Grove Village elk logo and an arch and hammers of Pernik.
Earlier this year, leaders of a Bulgarian school, who meet at Elk Grove High School, made a pitch to the village to purchase the Elk Grove Township Day Care building that the village acquired in a land swap with Elk Grove Township.
Although that deal fell through, Johnson said he got to know leaders in the Bulgarian community through those negotiations. Members of that group knew Ivan Anchev, Bulgarian consul general in Chicago.
Mayor Tserovska said she was looking to partner with an American city in the Chicago area, as Chicago has one of the largest Bulgarian populations in the United States, and she had personal contacts in the Chicago area.
Tserovska said her community is similar to Elk Grove Village and sees the village as an ideal fit. Located near the Bulgarian capital, Pernik is close to 80,000 in population, was built on mining and sits on a major highway linking Bulgaria to Serbia, Greece and Macedonia.
Mayor Tserovska said she wants to create a central industrial district in her community similar to the Elk Grove Business Park. Businesses in her community are scattered throughout.
Elk Grove Village maintains a formal sister city agreement with the Sicilian community of Termini Imerese and a friendship agreement with Ixtapa, Mexico.
Johnson said stone cutting businesses from Termini Immerse, which make kitchen and other countertops, have opened businesses in the village’s business park. Students from Termini Immerse are expected to arrive in Elk Grove Village next week to experience life with Elk Grove families, Elk Grove High School and the American Thanksgiving tradition.
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