Our Team
JOHN SHMORHUN
Founder & CEO
John Shmorhun is a high level management executive with 27 years experience working with private and NGO organizations. His experience is working in agriculture and manufacturing, primarily in Ukraine. Since February 2022, John has led numerous developmental projects in Eastern Ukraine that were oriented around job creation for IDP’s, engagement with local communities, medical services outreach and climate smart agricultural projects.
ANNA PASHYNSKA
Ukraine Partnership Director
Co-founder and curator of city development laboratory METALAB and urban festival "City Scanning Session" in Ivano-Frankivsk (Ukraine). Anna was studying in technical universities of Lviv (Ukraine) and Vienna (Austria), she was a part of the first Studio by CANactions School For Urban Studies, developing Urban Constitution for Ivano-Frankivsk. She has more than 7 years of experience in urbanism, architecture, and design in Ukraine and Austria, as a curator, project manager, urbanist and designer.
JOHN D'ANIERI
US Partnership Director
An American living in Maine, John is an experienced progressive educator, non-profit consultant, facilitator, and social entrepreneur specializing in starting and supporting innovative human-centered initiatives. In addition to work with initiatives led by the Annenberg Institute, the Gates Foundation and EL Education, he's founded and led several grassroots non-profits as Executive Director and consulted with many more, specializing in governance and start-up/scaling challenges.
PATRICIA (TUSCIA) SHMORHUN HAWRYLYSHYN
CoFounder
A Swiss Canadian of Ukrainian heritage, raised in Geneva, Tuscia is a psychologist by training, a graduate of the University of Geneva , Switzerland, with a Master’s degree in Educational psychology from McGill University, Montreal. She is Cofounder of Bohdan Hawrylyshyn Family Foundation, Founding Partner of Porcelain Medical Group and co-founder of PSI- Pechersk International School – in Kyiv, Ukraine.
ANDY KUZICH
COO and Finance Director
A Ukrainian-British Senior business development professional in Ukraine with work experience in Ukraine, UK and Russia, Andy is highly effective in a boardroom environment. He is experienced in managing pipelines of new business projects and leading teams to deliver results, with a wide range of contacts in Ukraine and internationally built up over many years. Since Feb. 2022, he's helped lead UEP's humanitarian initiatives in Ukraine to create homes and communities for IDPs.
MoveUkraineUS Board
Our work began with the collective efforts of five siblings, their adult children and partners to answer the question: What can we do? We pooled together enough funds and connections for John's initial trip to Ukraine, where he met and travelled with the Ukraine team pictured above. Out of that came our "people-to-project" funding idea, which required a US-registered non-profit in order to receive tax-free donations. This is a founding board: 3 individuals with varied and crucial experience who agreed to serve as a start-up board for the purposes of our 501(c)3 application while we build the the most effective Board possible for the longer term.
IRev. Margaret D'Anieri
President
Margaret is an Episcopal priest and Canon for Mission for the Diocese of Ohio as well as co-owner of Black River Organics. Her previous career was in Operations and Strategic Planning for a Fortune 500 company.
Charlie Mitchell
VP and Secretary
Charlie is a writer and sustainable food systems advocate living in Minneapolis. He was a fellow at the think tank Data for Progress and served on the board of non-profits in Vt. and Wisconson. His work has appeared in the Guardian, Mother Jones, Vox, and The New Republic.
I Mel Morales
Treasurer
Mel is Assistant Branch Manager of Bangor Savings Bank in Brunswick, ME. Mel's experience with finance and banking, attention to detail, and community spirit have already been invaluable.