It's official; Steinbach and Zaporizhia, Ukraine will become twin cities. Mayor Chris Goertzen says the idea was born when he visited that city in December of 2016 while attending a Mayor's International Congress in Ukraine. A number of Mennonite families in Steinbach have ancestors who lived there and later immigrated to Canada and there have also been some families making the move in the past year or so. Goertzen says Zaporizhia has sent a letter to confirm it wants to formally develop a relationship with Steinbach.

"They are very excited about becoming a twin city with the City of Steinbach. Now we are two cities that are very different in size, they have about 700,000 people, we have 16,000 or 17,000 people. But at the same time we have a strong history. We have a lot to learn from each other and we have a lot of connections, not just in the past but in the present. So we look forward to developing that relationship in the coming months."

Goertzen says they will exchange information via e-mail to learn from each other.

"We can exchange information on how we develop our cities. We are a very fast-growing city, they certainly would like to see the growth that we have. At the same time, we are both cities that are in cold climates so the challenges that we face with cold climates and our infrastructure are things that they would like to tackle as well. I think they may have a few things to learn from us and we may well have a few things to learn from them while creating strong connections. We can make connections about our history but also on what we can do business-wise and otherwise to make sure we both prosper."

He notes delegations from City of Zaporizhia come to Canada fairly often so there may be some opportunities for face-to-face discussions as well.