Winter in Ukraine is far from over: Northwest Georgians can still help
As February sets in, I can see Northwest Georgians getting set to welcome spring. In other parts of the world, though, hard winter still has quite a way to go.
One of those places is Ukraine where snow blankets the ground in many places and fighting continues, leaving infrastructure severely weakened or nonexistent. Civilians are struggling just to stay warm in homes and shelters. It’s a situation many of us can’t imagine, but it’s also one I think many North Georgians want to help with. They might just not be sure where to begin.
Enter Helping Ukraine, the Atlanta-based nonprofit that began in early 2022. I spoke recently with Emory Morsberger, the organization’s founder, to get a sense of how aid efforts are going and how Georgians can contribute.
For many years, Morsberger has been a leader in major community revitalization efforts in metro Atlanta, and his acumen when it comes to moving projects forward shone through in our talk. I could hear the determination in his voice when he spoke about helping to warm Ukraine’s civilian population through an effort called Heating Point that’s taking place there now.
There are a couple of inches of snow on the ground in many places in Ukraine, he explained, and temps regularly fall below 20 F. He said he expected to see winter last through March. Helping Ukraine is helping to combat the effects of the cold by collecting donations
stateside to purchase heating supplies like blankets, wood stoves and generators.
“We’re buying wood-burning stoves that are fabricated in the shipyards of Odessa from recycled steel … for $140 with the pipes that you need to hook it up, and then volunteers are installing those, and those are going into the smaller villages that are not going to be getting power anytime soon,” he explained.
The organization is distributing supplies by partnering with Americans from Georgia and Tennessee who have provided a boots-on-the-ground presence in Ukraine. One of those travelers is Ken Ward, of Rome, who has made numerous trips to Ukraine to deliver these supplies.
Ward is in Ukraine right now, but he picked right up when I called. He only had a few minutes, and I felt lucky
to catch him and get an update on what his distribution efforts look like from an onthe-ground vantage point.
“They’re just so humbled and thankful and encouraged to keep on going. That’s what motivates me,” he said of the recipients of his donation deliveries. “I look in their eyes and acknowledge to them that they’re somebody and somebody else cares in a universal language.”
Photos he’s shared with me show him hugging older people bundled against the cold.
Since its inception, Helping Ukraine has raised $600,000, Morsberger told me, but the actual dollar value of its contributions is significantly higher. The organization also works to distribute medical equipment, and free shipping and donations have helped on everything from pallets and syringes to
surgical equipment and incubators with battery backups.
“It has to be fully functional, but we’ve sent way over $1,000,000 over there worth of supplies,” Morsberger said. “We’re buying anywhere we can get the supplies that we want for the best possible price, including shipping. And we’re focusing on medical equipment that is going to probably 20 different Ukraine hospitals, including three along the warfront.”
Meanwhile, a Ukrainian winter wears on, and he’s acutely aware that civilians need aid to keep warm.
“We’ve got another two months of freezing temperatures where you couldn’t live in a structure without some kind of heat without freezing,” he said.
For more information and to help with Heating Point, visit helpingukraine.us.