It was the first time Francisco Hernandez Barcelo had been in the United States since he was a teenage meatpacker in the Bronx in the 1950s.

And it is the first time a Cuban mayor has made an official visit to an American city since the United States imposed an embargo on Cuba 39 years ago in an effort to force democratic and free-market reforms on the island's communist government.

"This is a small, historical step," said the mayor of Regla, referring to his weeklong trip to the Bay Area. "It could be the beginning of a better relationship for our two countries. At any rate, it's being driven by warmth and friendship, and that has a multiplier effect."

Indeed, Barcelo and Raul Genaro Gil Sanchez, Regla's director of mental health, were surrounded by new friends. The city's harbormaster showed up for dinner, along with an epidemiologist from the county health department. The librarian poured wine as her arborist husband put the finishing touches on the curry and threw together a salad with avocados fresh off his tree.

All belong to the Richmond-Regla Friendship Committee -- which organized the Cubans' visit -- and hope their efforts at "people-to-people" diplomacy will help normalize relations between the United States and Cuba.

"You might look to a big city to make big (policy) changes, but I think Richmond and Regla have the heart and the will to do it," said Ruth Rodriguez, a member of the committee.

"Regla is like the forgotten little city near Havana, the same way we feel overlooked beside San Francisco and Oakland," she said.

Richmond and Regla have much in common: both are small industrial cities with ports, shipyards and oil refineries on the edge of major urban centers. Regla, population 43,000, is a ferry ride across Havana Bay from Cuba's capital city. Like Richmond, population 99,200, Regla has a large black community -- it is known as a center of Afro-Cuban music and dance. It's also the birthplace of former Oakland A's slugger Jose Canseco.

Sister-city relationships between the United States and Cuba are a relatively recent phenomenon. The first, created in 1993, linked Mobile and Havana. Since then, six others have formed.

The Richmond-Regla relationship was formalized in September 1999. Oakland has since found a sister city in Santiago de Cuba.

Sister Cities International in Washington, D.C., did not recognize sister- city links with any nation with which the United States did not have diplomatic relations until this year, when the group expanded its membership to include Cuba.

Critics of Cuban leader Fidel Castro are skeptical of such contacts, saying Cuba under Castro is repressive and undemocratic.

But Rep. George Miller, D-Martinez, "supports the exchange of friendship and ideas between the two cities," said his district director, David Tucker. "Forming these relationships will change the perceptions we have of Cuba, and that's a good thing."

Miller sent letters to the U.S. State Department to help ensure Barcelo and Sanchez got visas.

But a third Regla representative was denied a visa, said Jose Luis Noa, of the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, D.C. "There are still problems with this kind of interchange," said Noa, noting that in the past year the United States has denied visas to a number of Cuban mayors hoping to visit their sister cities.

"This visit is very important because it helps improve communication between the countries," Noa said.

Barcelo and Sanchez visited Richmond's health clinics and hospitals, schools and libraries, art center, marina and city council chambers. They toured the University of California at Berkeley campus, lunched with Francis Ford Coppola at his North Beach restaurant, took in a Golden State Warriors game and hiked in Muir Woods.

Richmond Mayor Irma Anderson has been a prime mover behind the sister-city relationship. She headed a 21-person delegation to Regla in 1999 and said she was impressed by its health and education systems.

"Theirs is community-oriented health care," said Anderson, former director of public health nursing in Contra Costa County. "They have no morbidity in childbirth because they do follow-up. If the mother doesn't make it to the doctor's office, they visit her at home."

Anderson, who took Barcelo on a tour of Richmond, said she was aiming to establish exchanges between the two cities in health care, education and the arts.

By Friday, the two mayors had a long list of plans.

They hope to send Richmond schoolteachers to Cuba to learn why Regla has a 98 percent literacy rate. And they want to send a team of public health professionals to study Regla's highly regarded community-based mental health system.

In turn, Regla officials are eager to emulate the Richmond-based National Institute for Arts and Disabilities. And they hope Richmond's city manager will fly down and help them improve their city's administration.

©2001 San Francisco Chronicle

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