DERBY, Vt. (WCAX) – A Derby ministry that opened last year to house Ukrainian refugees is downsizing amid a swirl of questions. It was first reported by VTDigger but was confirmed independently by WCAX News. About 150 refugees have made Vermont home since Russia invaded last year, but not all of their experiences have been similar.
“We are people of faith. Our faith is put in God — and we have seen him — because he is so concerned. He’s concerned about Ukraine more than all of us combined,” said Scott Cianciolo when we spoke to him last November.
Cianciolo, along with his wife Theresa, began taking in Ukrainian refugees a little more than a year ago at their Home of Agape House of Mercy shelter in Derby. The couple’s Agape Ministry Inc., converted an old nursing home and began taking refugees as part of the federal Uniting for Ukraine program. “We work with children with special needs from Ukraine and adults who are medically fragile. We help them come over and facilitate medical care and educational care for them,” Theresa explained at the time.
But the couple’s mission slowly crumbled over the past year. Cianciolo says his wife was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer and running the home was too much to juggle. As many as 30 Ukrainian refugees were staying in the home at one time.
Officials with the Vermont State Refugee say some of the refugees living in the home raised concerns shortly after arriving. “The expectation of services that might be available when the Ukrainians came over with this particular group up in the Derby area. Also, conditions in the household, rules in the household, kind of the general exchange of information and access to services,” said Tracy Dolan, Vermont’s state refugee director.
At least one person who lived in the home, who asked not to be identified, told us the Cianciolos were dishonest and immoral and that things didn’t feel right in the home.
The couple say they never claimed to be a medical facility and only wanted to provide refuge to Ukrainians in need. Questions remain, though, about how the couple used state and federal funding. State officials have tip-toed around what happened and exactly what conditions existed at the home.
The House of Mercy is now up for sale and the refugees who lived there are gone. Dolan confirms that concerns raised by refugees led the office to call for a state and federal investigation and that there was a “breakdown” involving the Cianciolos. “Either the sponsor may have not been providing the services that were expected of the program or may have raised expectations about medical care,” Dolan said.
The Cianciolos declined an interview request about the allegations and investigation, only saying in a statement that the refugees staying with them have been relocated — with some choosing to stay in Vermont — and that they will be focusing on their local community ministry.
Related Story:
Vermont family making a difference in the lives of Ukrainian refugees