La Crosse keeps ties with Russian sister city, despite war in Ukraine

Russian military attacks on Ukraine have angered some people in the La Crosse area, because some Russian missiles and other equipment are made in the city of Dubna. That community has been La Crosse’s sister city in Russia for more than 30 years.

Chuck Hanson with the La Crosse-Dubna Friendship Association hopes that the foreign war will not damage the tie between the two communities.

“Average people in different countries really have the same concerns,” Hanson told WIZM’s La Crosse Talk. “You’re concerned about your children, you’re concerned about how the roads are gonna get fixed, concerned about health and all those kinds of things.”

The city of La Crosse officially reacted to the Ukraine war last year by removing the Russian flag from a sister-city display at the airport.

Hanson says if the sister city connection between Dubna and La Crosse was ended, it wouldn’t make any difference to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“Yes, what he’s doing is awful, but let’s do something that’s positive,” says Hanson. “If we…ended our relationship with Dubna, Russia, you think Putin would care? He doesn’t even know about it.”

Hanson says that the sister city partnership allows people to bond on an individual and local level, while trying to keep politics at a distance.