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By John L. Valentine
President of the Utah Senate

Yesterday, we had the extraordinary honor of hosting fifteen people from Kyrgyzstan here at the Utah State Senate.

The Kyrgyz delegation is in Utah for a week to study America's political processes and the Rule of Law. Senators McCoy, Bramble, Dmitrich and I, along with Rusty Butler of UVSC, Representative Chris Herrod (who speaks Russian), and a few gifted staff replicated a legislative session and the Kyrgyz leaders played the part of Utah State Senators.

They debated a mock bill, followed parliamentary procedure, tried to amend the bill twice, and ultimately killed it. When it was time to adjourn, they voted NOT to adjourn. Apparently we were doing something right and they wanted to stay.

We had a great three hours. It was wonderful to spend time with good people from a part of the world beginning to find its way toward a stable democracy and self rule.

We hope they take something good with them as they return to their beautiful country. Wonderful people. We wish them the best.

Their visit to Utah is hosted by UVSC's Office of International Affairs and the Open World Program (which is operated by the Open World Leadership Center at the U.S. Library of Congress).

5 Comments:

 Voice of Utah said...

I am not going to make any jokes about the productivity of these Kyrgyzstan legislators vs. our own legislators.
Must...resist...temptation...

9/13/2007 7:25 PM  

 Part of the Plan said...

Well, I can't help myself. This is just too tempting:

You must have picked the animal torture bill to debate.

9/14/2007 8:26 AM  

 The Senate Site said...

Smart alecks. They debated a bill imposing a 5 percent severance tax on uranium mining. One amendment dropped it to three percent. The other applied the new funds to education.

9/14/2007 9:04 AM  

 CraigJ said...

Fascinating stuff! Kudos to our legislature for sharing their experience. And perhaps our lawmakers got some good tips on dealing with Utah's burgeoning Yak lobby.

9/15/2007 6:10 PM  

 Anonymous said...

I am Kyrgyz and I believe my countrymen were quite productive during this visit. It is a shame to read such negative statements from the website readers. The Kyrgyz would never say something outrageous like "I am not going to make any jokes about the productivity of these Kyrgyzstan legislators vs. our own legislators." if American colleagues visited them here. As the Russian saying goes "Po sebe ne sudyat...".

Thanks for everything you did for the Kyrgyz delegation, Mr.Valentine.

2/13/2008 8:15 PM  

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