Sonoma County’s unique connection with Ukraine

Sonoma County is the only place in the United States with three different Ukrainian sister cities. The oldest and strongest sister city organization in Sonoma County is the Sonoma Sister Cities Association founded in 1975. The city began an arrangement for a sister city with the Ukrainian town of Kaniv located in central Ukraine in 1986. For over 35 years there have been citizen diplomacy exchanges and visits going on between residents of Sonoma County and some residents of Ukraine coming and going back and forth to visit each other’s lands and hometowns. On March 17, 2022 Sonoma welcomed The Ukrainian Consul General for California to the Sonoma City Hall for a noon time reception where he spoke to a crowd of local residents. It was reported Dmytro Kushneruk the Consul General was given a key to the city as recognition of the 35-year bond between the cities.

More information about the Sonoma sister city relationships for local citizen diplomacy can be found at the website https://sonomasistercitiesassociation.org/.

There is currently much in the news about the Russian invasion of Ukraine on Feb 24, 2022. This article focuses on citizen diplomacy efforts underway for decades between Sonoma County residents and Ukrainians by way of Sister City International organizations. Before describing the other two Ukrainian sister city relationships in Sonoma County here is a brief description of what these arrangements entail.

According to the website for the Sister Cities organization headquarters in Washington DC, “Sister Cities International was created at President Eisenhower's 1956 White House conference on citizen diplomacy.” The webpage goes on to state, “Eisenhower envisioned an organization that could be the hub of peace and prosperity by creating bonds between people from different cities around the world.” Further information about the efforts of the organization globally can be found at their website: https://sistercities.org/about-us/our-mission/

Santa Rosa has a sister city agreement with Cherkasy, Ukraine also located in central Ukraine along the Dneiper River. The city of over 250,000 people is over 725 years old. The relationship began in 1989 with the establishment of a formal agreement between residents of Santa Rosa and Cherkasy being recognized by Santa Rosa city officials. The Sister City International organization has information about Cherkasy on their website. It can be accessed at https://en.sistercity.info/sister-cities/Cherkasy.html

Years ago local residents in Santa Rosa, such as Catherine Held, helped to establish a small Woman’s Center in an apartment in central Cherkasy. She made numerous visits into Cherkasy and made a film about how the women of Cherkasy were adjusting to the freedoms afforded them after independence was declare from the USSR, the former Soviet Union. The city does not have a website for the program.

Sebastopol has an agreement with Chyhyryn, Ukraine working through the group Sebastopol World Friends with a guiding principle of “World Peace, One Friend at a Time.” Information at https://sebastopolwf.org/

All three groups will be reaching out to help Ukraine more in the future. Please contact them.