Taiwanese Town Accepts Invitation to Become Diamond Bar’s Sister City

It took two years but Diamond Bar finally found a sibling.

Sanshia, Taiwan, on Tuesday accepted the Diamond Bar Sister City Assn. Inc.’s invitation to join the San Gabriel bedroom community’s modest family of 55,000 people, said Richard Callard, president of the association.

Five other Chinese-speaking cities in the last two years hoped to claim Diamond Bar as their sister city, Callard said.

A delegation from Haicheng, in the People’s Republic of China, traveled to Diamond Bar in 1994 to try to court the city into sisterhood, but Callard said he wanted nothing to do with them.

“They were 35 times larger than Diamond Bar,” Callard said. “And they didn’t quibble about it. They said right out that they wanted us for economic development.”

So, Diamond Bar, which has a significant Asian population, decided to seek out its own sister city. And because Diamond Bar approached Sanshia, Callard said he is certain that the Taiwanese city of 65,000 has a less economic motive for their acceptance.

“We went to them,” he said. “They have a high school, and that is very important.