North Bay residents with ties to Cuba welcome move to repair relations (w/video)

President Barack Obama’s move to restore diplomatic relations with Cuba came as a welcome surprise Wednesday for many residents in the North Bay with ties to the island nation.

Many praised the president’s action, saying it would strengthen familial ties, as well as benefit wine grape growers and other area businesses seeking to open up trade in Cuba. In addition to easing travel for family members, the policy changes are expected to boost exports to the small communist country.

“This is going to expedite the process to sell wine and other products coming out of the North Bay,” said Darius Anderson, a Sonoma Valley resident, lobbyist and developer who founded the nonprofit Californians Building Bridges. The organization is dedicated to humanitarian programs and people-to-people exchanges, particularly with Cuba. It put together this past summer a tour of Napa and Sonoma wineries and vineyards for a group of 22, mostly sommeliers, from leading restaurants and hotels in Cuba.

Cuba depends heavily on the United States for some of its foods, Anderson said. For example, he said, it imports much of its rice from the U.S. And as the nation continues to develop its tourism industry, he said it will seek other goods from Sonoma County, where about 500 Cuban-born residents live, and other parts of California.

“They’re going to need world-class wine. California is the place for that,” Anderson said.

Obama’s nationally televised announcement, he argued, “will go down in history like when Truman recognized Israel (and) Nixon recognized China.”

“It shows a tremendous amount of courage,” added Anderson, a principal of Sonoma Media Investments, which owns The Press Democrat.

Anderson first traveled to Cuba while in college in the mid ’80s and fell in love with the island’s music, culture and art. He has visited the nation more than 50 times since and facilitated trips for well over a thousand people in the past 14 years. He anticipates it’ll get easier to organize those trips.

“It’ll be like travel to Hawaii,” he said.

Orlando Raola, a chemistry professor at Santa Rosa Junior College, shared similar enthusiasm.

“This is a long-overdue move,” he said on Wednesday.

Some Cuban-Americans were frustrated and concerned the president would not follow through on earlier promises to take steps to normalize U.S. relations with Cuba. He said the president took a large step, but there’s much work ahead.

“There’s a lot of mending to do,” said Raola, who was born in Havana and came to the U.S. more than two decades ago at the age of 36.

Not all welcomed Obama’s move. It faced condemnation Wednesday from some Cuban-Americans and politicians on both sides of the aisle who say it would embolden and extend the regime now headed by Raú l Castro, the brother of ailing revolutionary Fidel Castro. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., and Sen. Robert Menendez, D-New Jersey, both were sharply critical of Obama’s plans.

But increased interaction between the two countries could create a shift in attitudes among their residents, said Ruben Armiñana, president of Sonoma State University, who left his native Cuba in 1961.

Armiñana said it would help “remove the demonization of each country by the other country.”

Armiñana said in the past there were efforts to improve relations between the United States and Cuba, but “special interests” who benefited from the economic embargo and frozen political relations got in the way.

“Those opportunities have been sabotaged by interests on both sides,” he said. “Hopefully, those special interests will not prevail (this time).”

He was among the thousands of children who were airlifted out of Cuba and arrived unaccompanied in the U.S. in the early 1960s under what’s now known as Operation Pedro Pan. Armiñana, who went to live with an uncle, didn’t see his parents until nine years later, when he was finishing up graduate school.

He voiced optimism that the shift in policy would put pressure on the Cuban regime to be “more open” after decades of it “squandering” opportunities to make the nation “a more equitable, fair and prosperous society.” He expects most residents on the island will embrace the changes, particularly because it could bring improvements to technology to keep them in touch with relatives in the United States.

“Cubans have a very strong family bond that supersedes ideology,” Armiñana explained.

Elizabeth Tormo, who last month opened the Rumba Cuban Cafe in Windsor, said she had relatives celebrating in both Sonoma County and Miami.

“Everyone is ecstatic,” said Tormo, who was born in Havana but moved to New Jersey as a 9-year-old. “Everyone today is drinking a rum and Coke.”

“One day,” she added, “it’ll be Cuba Libre.”

Just before going to work Wednesday, Tormo said her aunt burst into her room to share the president’s news.

She said she’s never returned to Cuba since leaving, in part because of all the red tape involved with seeking a travel permit. Her children, who were born in the U.S., also were restricted from traveling to the country, she added.

“I haven’t been to Cuba in over ?30 years,” she said. “It was the process that discouraged me. … I would love for my kids to go to Cuba. I would love to go to Cuba.”

While she’s excited about the changes, she said it means more to the eldest members of her family, including her father, aunt and mother-in-law.

“They needed to see this happen before passing away,” Tormo said, adding that her mother died three years ago before ever being able to return to Cuba to see two sisters who stayed behind more than 30 years ago.

“They needed to see change,” Tormo said.

You can reach Staff Writer Eloísa Ruano González at 521-5458 or ?eloisa.gonzalez@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @eloisanews.