Cape Coral community members unhappy with city’s trip to China

Neighbors say they had no idea an expensive trip that will send city leaders on a trip overseas was approved.

The City of Cape Coral plans to spend about $17,000 to send city council members to China.

There seems to be no record of the trip approval in any of the agenda details over the past month. And in last week’s agenda, there is no item to approve the reported business trip; however, it was approved in a 4-3 vote. This made community members furious, and some showed up to the recent meeting to complain.

“The China trip should not be taking place,” Lynn Rosko said.

Despite opposition, Mayor Joe Coviello and four other city leaders will go on the trip to the Asian continent. The plan is to lock into a sister city cultural partnership with Baise, China. The city said Cape Coral could benefit from it economically.

”They went and got their visas May 3 – 10 days before the meeting on Monday night when they were voting to approve it,” Rosko said. “They already had the visas. It was a done deal.”

The city attorney said the public had opportunities to speak against it over 10 times before the decision was approved.

We asked to speak to council members for comment one-on-one, but they didn’t want to answer questions. When we spoke to the mayor, he said the city leaders are going, and it’s a done deal.