Sault Ste. Marie, the binational city: two nations, one city

What are the dimensions of our unique international municipal relationship that we can grow so we may become a bi-national region? Marie is a region. It was certainly one region prior to making the St. Mary's river a section of the international border. For a moment let's cast aside that fact that one city belongs to one state and one country while the other city belongs to one province and one co

untry. We are sister cities. Can we creatively think of the ways in which we could pool our scarce resources so that we have the critical mass to attract investment in the area? What are our commonalities? What are the bonds that bind us into one. For example, let's look at education. In our bi-national region, we have three publicly-funded school districts, one charter school and one private school. With limited funding from our collective national, state and provincial governments, are there areas in which we can co-operate to enrich the youth in our sister cities? We share the same weather, drinking water source, air and soil. Only laws separate our cities. Could we work toward becoming Sault Ste. Marie, the bi-national city: two nations, one city? We could create a model that would be the envy of border communities across the globe. Let's think big first, then later we can deal with the laws.