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Kyrylivka Territorial Community
Zaporizhzhia
Population:
The Kyrylivka Settlement Territorial Community is located in the Melitopol District of the Zaporizhia Region.
The area of the community is 662.1 square kilometres.
The population of the community amounts to 5,939 people (as of 24 February 2022).
Men: 2,815 persons
Women: 3,124 persons
Working population: 3,020 persons (as of 24 February 2022)
The Community includes eight communities: one urban-type settlement and seven villages, with the administrative centre in the village of Kyrylivka
Coordinates on the map: 46.37175450909142, 35.37006277067922
History
Kyrylivka was founded in the early 19th century by a religious group that was forcibly resettled from the Tambov and Voronezh provinces. Its name comes from the name of its first resident – Kyrylo Kapustin.
In the 1920s, a balneological and mud resort began to be developed, and the latter developed most intensively during the 1960s – 1980s. It was during this period that the entire Fedotova Spit and the Peresyp Spit were built up with campsites, boarding houses and recreation facilities.
There are 41 cultural heritage landmarks in the territory of the community: 38 archaeological and 3 historical sites. Work has begun on entering the unique buildings of the Philiber family in the territory of the village of Atmanai into the register of material cultural heritage landmarks.
Furthermore, the Church of St. Nicholas the Wonderworker of Mirlikia is located in Kyrylivka.
Economy and Welfare
Its special geographical location on the shore of the Sea of Azov and its unique natural resources formed the priority sectors in the development of the community – recreation, agriculture, and fishing.
Interestingly, in terms of the number of plant and animal organisms, the Sea of Azov has no match in the world. In terms of the number of fish per unit area, the Sea of Azov exceeds the Caspian Sea by 6.5 times, the Black Sea by 40 times, and the Mediterranean Sea by 160 times.
Sanatoriums, recreation centres and children’s health facilities are the mainstay of the local economy. Related services have developed as well: entertainment, public catering, and trade.
Before the full-scale invasion, the village of Kyrylivka was one of the famous and popular resorts, both in Ukraine and abroad. It was the largest resort in the Azov region in terms of the number of tourists and the number of recreation centres in the area. There are more than 550 recreation centres in the village. During the high season, Kyrylivka was visited by about two million tourists before the full-scale invasion.
The community has two estuaries: Utliutskyi and Molochnyi, which have the potential for fishing, and rivers: Atmanai, Velykyi Utliuh, and Malyi Utliuh.
In the summer, there were two amusement parks, the largest open-air water park in Ukraine, a dolphinarium, an aquarium and a terrarium. Given the favourable climatic conditions, windsurfing and kiteboarding developed well, and several schools of these sports were active.
Unfortunately, during the full-scale invasion the tourism business in Kyrylivka has suffered great losses. There are practically no places left on the coast that would not have suffered from the marauding occupying forces. They are taking over the best holiday facilities, the owners of which had been creating comfort and cosiness for tourists for years. The invaders “nationalized” the largest water park – Treasure Island – on the Azov coast with an area of 60,000 square metres. And the dolphinarium located next to the water park was looted.
Community and War
With the beginning of the full-scale invasion, the Kyrylivka Community found itself under occupation. From the first days, a clear system of cooperation between the local authorities, businesses, and the public was established in the community. All the necessary services continued to work in a higher alert mode on a 24/7 basis. The leadership of the community has established a system of providing the vulnerable categories of the population with humanitarian aid and medicines. Free bread was baked in the community for large families, low-income families, and pensioners.
The large-scale evacuation of the population began in the first days of the occupation of the territory of the community.
On March 25, russian troops occupied Kyrylivka. The head of the community refused to cooperate with them.
Today, approximately 40% of the population still stay in the community, the vast majority of whom are pensioners and elderly people. In April 2022, the first evacuation bus departed from the village with the residents of the community fleeing the occupation.
In the early morning of May 24, the invaders captured the head of the community, his deputy and the director of the local municipal institution, and later an employee of the financial department of the settlement council. As a consequence, the village was finally taken over by the invaders.
After the release from captivity, the team of the village head moved to the territory controlled by Ukraine in the city of Zaporizhia and continues to ensure the work of the community.
Communication with the residents of the community, who had left the community, was established. They created a special Telegram community channel for communication because more than 60% of the population left the occupied territory. Fruitful cooperation with various charitable foundations and volunteer organizations made it possible to provide residents with humanitarian aid, organize various activities for children and adults, and receive educational tablets for children from low-income and large families.
The residents of the community help the Armed Forces of Ukraine: they donate money, knit socks, and hand over various hygiene products. All in all, they have sewn more than 3,000 pillows for the military.
The leadership of the community is preparing for the de-occupation of the territory and is establishing relations with various international foundations and organizations.
People of the Community
From September 2010 to the present, Ivan Maleiev has been confidently working as the Kyrylivka Settlement head. Important principles of the head’s work are: power for the people, openness to the people, not one’s own interests, but the interests of the residents, priority to the local residents.
Under the leadership of the head of the community, new flower beds, children’s and sports grounds have been installed in all the settlements of the community, four fountains have been built, an I LOVE KYRYLIVKA sign has been installed in the centre of the village, a creative stele “Maiak” and a large LED screen on the building of the village council have been installed. The street lighting has been replaced with a new, more efficient one. They have also bought new equipment for one of the municipal companies, which can now produce its own pavement.
The future depends on the children and this area is very important for the settlement head. There are three kindergartens and three secondary schools in the territory of the community. In recent years, the premises of some of the community’s schools have been overhauled.
In the community’s schools, free meals (buffet table) have been organized for all the schoolchildren of the community at the expense of the local budget.
The head of the settlement together with the counsellors understand well that the population of the community should actively promote a healthy lifestyle, therefore they pay attention to the development of culture and sports in their territory. For this purpose, there are sports and art schools, five cultural centres, four libraries and three public museums in the territory.
The artistic teams of the community have been Grand Prix winners and laureates of various international and Ukrainian national festivals and contests on multiple occasions. With the support of Ivan Maleiev, the Kyrylivka-Fest Ukrainian national festival and contest was held in Kyrylivka, which was attended by more than 2,000 participants from 10 regions of Ukraine in 2018. At the festival, a Ukrainian record was set for the largest number of participants of the instrumental genre – 211.
Development Strategy
In 2021, the implementation of the project “Construction of a Sports Complex on Azovskyi Avenue in the Settlement of Kyrylivka of the Yakymivka District of the Zaporizhia Region” began. The project implementation period: 2021 – 2022. The total cost of the project amounted to UAH 55.1 million. The project was submitted for participation in the project contest under the Ukraine Recovery Program. The implementation of the project began at the expense of the local budget, and construction works started.
In 2021, the Zofia large-scale investment project to build Europe’s largest wind power plant began to be implemented in the territory of the Kyrylivka Community.
The project “Drinking Water Supply Line from the Village of Davydivka to the Village of Atmanai in the Yakymivka District of the Zaporizhia Region (Construction) Phase I-II” was completed in 2019. The implementation period was 2019 – 2022. However, it was implemented within 2.5 months. The length of the water pipeline is 19,388 km.
In the future, it is advisable to develop sanatorium-resort facilities in the territory of the community, taking into account the healing characteristics of estuaries, create rehabilitation centres, including for the rehabilitation of military personnel, develop conference tourism, sports, come up with new tourist products at the existing recreation centres (schools of English for schoolchildren on holidays at the seaside, fitness tours, etc.), and develop green tourism.