Help Our Sister City Now!

Sebastopol, California and Chyhyryn, Ukraine have maintained a deep relationship through cultural exchanges and special projects as sister cities since 1993.

Located more or less in the center of Ukraine, in Cherkasy Oblast, Chyhyryn’s current population is around 11,000. Chyhyryn is also in the same region as the two other Sonoma county sister cities: Cherkasy (sister to Santa Rosa) and Kaniv (sister to Sonoma).

Chyhyryn is similar to Sebastopol in many ways – it is small and agricultural, has its own police and fire department, several restaurants, parks, a medical clinic, a small university, two museums, and three K-12 schools. And both of us deeply care about and work toward world peace.

Although not in the area of conflict at this time, our friends in Chyhyryn are currently hosting around 2,000 displaced people from the east and the south of Ukraine. While the people of Chyhyryn are proud to assist their neighbors, the impacts of so many new people in such a small town are great.

Sebastopol World Friends is starting a campaign to collect money specifically to assist our sister city, Chyhyryn in providing for the needs of those fleeing the war, and other war related impacts.