Residents in the Quinte area are ready to open their homes to refugees fleeing Ukraine during the fighting with Russia.
Orlando Ferro, Executive Director of Quinte United Immigration Service tells Quinte News that about 80 people in this area have offered to share their homes with immigrants from Ukraine, if and when they come.
Ferro says he assumes many of the Ukrainian immigrants would go west to Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta since they may have relatives there.
“Right now what is happening is that they’re giving preference for those refugees whose relatives live in Canada. There’s a huge (Ukrainian-Canadian) community in the west of Canada.”
Ferro says there will be a “vetting process” of these volunteers, checking out the houses and what kinds of conditions people are offering.
“A lot of people are offering their houses but there has to be also has to be a vetting process for liability. We need to know the conditions of the housing. What the terms and conditions are they offering? There’s a lot of other things in the background that we have to work.”
He added, “We just don’t know how the federal government will be distributing the influx of refugees.”
Ferro further explained, “Just for risk management … right now we’re just getting the offers and putting a data base together.”
