By DAVID DUPONT
BG Independent News
Almost a year since Russia invaded Alona Matchenko’s homeland, the voices she hears from Ukraine are unanimous. “Ukrainian people continue to say: ‘we will not give up,’” she said. “No heat, no light, no food, no water – after all that horror and sorrow and pain, they say no damn Russians on our land. They will suffer as long as needed until every Russian soldier leaves Ukrainian land. That’s what I hear from everyone.”
Matchenko is equally determined to do what she can to help Ukraine from her home in Northwest Ohio.
Matchenko, a University of Toledo law student, businesswoman, and mother from Perrysburg, has launched a new effort through Toledo Helps Ukraine, an aid organization she founded last year. From now through Feb. 7, Toledo Helps Ukraine along with Impact and Inspire, ProMedica’s young professionals networking group, is collecting needed humanitarian items, enough to fill a shipping container.
Items sought are:
- Non-Perishable Food and Water
- Thermal Underwear (all sizes)
- Power sources (generators, power blocks, batteries)
- Cold Weather Items (blankets, hand, and feet warmers)
- Medical Supplies (tourniquets, first aid kits, painkillers)
- Miscellaneous items such as candles, flashlights, batteries, tape.
- Monetary donations to help Ukrainians seeking temporary refuge in the United States.
The collection sites include East Hall 212 on the Bowling Green State University campus. Items will be collected there through Feb. 3.
Other sites collecting through Feb 7 are:
- Barr’s Public House (3355 Briarfield Blvd., Maumee),
- Fusion Bistro (3136 Markway Road, Toledo)
- The ProMedica Downtown Steam Plant Headquarters (100 Madison Ave., Toledo).
An event to collect and pack items donated to ship to Ukraine will be hosted by Impact and Inspire on Thursday, Feb. 9 from 5:30-8 p.m. at Handmade Toledo, 1717 Adams St., Toledo.
Matchenko said teaming up with ProMedica made this drive possible. They are able to do much of the heavy lifting.
This will be the third shipment of humanitarian aid provided by Toledo Helps Ukraine to the embattled republic.
Last spring, she went to Ukraine to deliver supplies. Those were purchased from Costco and other outlets in Poland using money donated by people in Northwest Ohio.
[RELATED: Alona Matchenko personally delivers aid from Toledo to embattled Ukrainians]
That trip was emotionally exhausting, she said, because of the experience of “seeing how people are internally displaced, how life has changed in Ukraine, how there were no jobs, and uncertainty everywhere. But the most impact it made on me was seeing injured soldiers. … The families were injured, too.” Their injuries were not physical, but they were still in pain.
“It took me the whole summer to recover from that trip,” Matchenko said.
She spent the summer as an intern in the Ohio Attorney General’s office in Columbus. “I could not ask for a better environment to be healed. I had co-workers who were very caring, and they were passionate to know what I could tell them.”
After her internship was over, she was permitted to give a presentation about Ukraine and her efforts to assist to the entire AG’s office.
Matchenko also recruited an attorney from the office to join herself and fellow law student Hope Luther as the volunteer managers of Toledo Helps Ukraine.
A second shipment of supplies was sent last year. Like the current drive, the aid was donated and purchased here in the United States.
That’s more efficient, Matchenko said.
The dollar goes further here, and they can benefit from the generosity of donors in Northwest Ohio, as well as companies that can donate pallets of supplies. The goods will be shipped to Gdansk, Poland, where a church group will pick it up and deliver it to Ukraine.
These drives were exhausting, so given Matchenko and Luther are law students, they opted to focus on an area more in line with their skills after the second shipment.
Toledo Helps Ukraine is working on helping Ukrainians find temporary refuge in the United States.
The federal Uniting for Ukraine program offers a pathway for Ukrainians to get temporary residence in the United States. The process is bureaucratic, and currently no other program in the country is available to assist finding sponsors.
A sponsor, Matchenko explained, does not bear any financial responsibility. There are minimal financial guidelines, but basically as long as a person can support themselves, they can be a sponsor.
One Bowling Green man is between academic jobs, and still was able to sponsor a Ukrainian. In that case it was a mother whose husband and two children had already been approved, but she had not been. His sponsorship allowed the family to be together.
Once the Ukrainians are here the sponsor will help them get on their feet and find the assistance they need. And there’s a lot of agencies here that can help, Matchenko said. Toledo Helps Ukraine has received requests from Florida and California from Americans who want to sponsor Ukrainian refugees.
The refugees are eligible for a range of government benefits including Medicaid and SNAP. They can work legally here. As “resourceful and hardworking people” they will help build the American economy, Matchenko said.
And they will be anxious to return to Ukraine once the war is over, she said. “When they arrive, they are so home sick. They want to go home.”
Toledo Helps Ukraine has helped settle 30 individuals, including two families in Toledo.
A retired school principal in Athens sponsored a family of seven.
Matchenko said she received a call from the mother, pleading for her children to be taken to America, even if she couldn’t go. “You don’t need to take me, take my children, so they can have a chance to survive,” she told Matchenko.
“Hearing that empowered me for the rest of the quarter,” Matchenko said.
In the end, the children and the father and the mother were accepted.
Area residents are determined to help Ukraine, Matchenko said.
They can help by:
- Becoming a sponsor for Ukrainians
- Becoming a sustaining donor
- Offering temporary housing of up to 90 days for newly arriving refugees.
“Northwest Ohio will continue to support Ukraine until Ukraine wins its freedom,” she said. “They didn’t provoke this war.”
She likened it to a home invasion. “We can compare that to what that big bully Russia is doing in Ukraine. If we don’t stop it that crocodile will come to our yard, and we don’t want that. I’m thrilled how the United States is continuing to support Ukraine.”
