An organization with a dual goal has been founded by a Gulf Breeze woman and her Ukrainian husband, who is currently on the ground in his war-torn country.
A Little More Help, a charity organization founded by Corinne and Kostyantyn Bilyayev, will generate money to support the continuing humanitarian situation in Ukraine and assist those living in and around the greater Pensacola area.
While waiting for the IRS to formally certify its 501(c)(3) status, A Little More Help has already registered with state authorities as a nonprofit.
Visiting summertime Ukrainian students:
For school, two teenagers from Ukraine travelled to Pensacola. They are now gaining support for the home.
Pensacola assistance: She is Ukrainian. From Russia, he is. Escambia musicians will perform a benefit performance for Ukraine.
“In essence, we want to help people out a little more, as the name suggests. You may be overwhelmed and dismayed by the sheer number of problems you see and think, “Oh, wow, there is nothing I can do,” “Corinne Bilyayev raised subjects including Pensacola’s local homelessness and poverty, as well as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
“But in reality, if you go up close to a lot of these people, you can see that they really only require a particular pair of shoes, a particular medication, or a small object.
Actually, there is a lot you can do to improve their personal condition and to help yourself feel useful and less useless.”
In light of Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine, A Little More Help will initially and primarily focus on raising money for those in need.
According to his wife, “Kostyantyn is much more effective to accomplish that task since he is there and because he is Ukrainian and obviously well linked with the Ukrainian community. “He’s present.
He is on the floor. He has the option of saying either “Oh sure, this man is authentic” or “This guy is a thief.””
An intimate tale from Pensacola
After meeting in Pensacola in 2017, Corinne, 45, and Kostyantyn, 47, fell in love right away. However, they have had to spend most of their marriage apart.
Corinne was working at Pensacola State College as a music instructor when they first met.
I said, “Ooh! I play the violin, too,” when his son mentioned that his father played the violin in class. He informed his father after returning home.
Kostyantyn Bilyayev was a co-owner and real estate developer of Pro Development at the time, which worked on several downtown Pensacola projects and constructed several neighbourhood homes.
His wife remembered, “We started playing together at one of the nearby Gulf Breeze assisted care homes. The more we studied and met, the more we were aware of our want to be together.
In 2018, the same year Kostyantyn learned of a family emergency, the couple got married. He quickly took a flight home to assist his father in caring for his mother after she shattered her hip.
However, it was soon clear that the wedding spouse would have difficulty returning once he was outside of U.S. borders.
“We hadn’t yet submitted the application for his green card due to the time he left. Thus, it entirely wrecked that process, forcing us to restart from outside the nation, which takes considerably longer than doing it from within, “Declared Corinne Bilyayev.
She has travelled to her husband’s home country of Ukraine nine times since he departed, and Kostyantyn felt compelled to stay there longer than anticipated in 2022 when his parents contracted the coronavirus.
His father was unwell, and his mother had passed away. Martial law was then enacted as the war broke out.
how the nonprofit was established
Since he was unable to leave Ukraine and return to his wife in Gulf Breeze, Kostyantyn has devoted his life to caring for his father and doing all he can to aid his fellow Ukrainians.
He has been buying and distributing prescription medications to senior citizens in isolated neighbourhoods close to Kharkiv, as well as clothing for orphans.
This spring, Corinne Bilyayev, a dyslexia tutor and teacher at the Gulf Breeze School of Music, collaborated with one of her mentors to raise $16,000 for Ukrainians, which her husband assisted in distributing.
She was delighted to have raised so much so quickly, but there were some financial concerns raised as well.
“I had to basically show that money as income today,” she added. “The question instantly became how can we do this lawfully.”
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To make similar future fundraisers easier, A Little More Help was established.
But Corinne Bilyayev was quick to point out that the foundation will provide aid to other countries as well. Long-term objectives for A Little More Help include becoming a significant player in the local charitable scene and providing assistance to those in need in the Panhandle.
A Little More Help board member Akeem Richard declared, “I do believe in Cori. “I do believe in what she does, that she cares about the neighbourhood, that she wants to help people in the ways she can, and that she is capable of doing so.
She can establish connections between those who have resources and others who need them. Simply put, that’s why I decided to join the company.”
Later this summer, A Little More Help will present two classical music benefit performances including cellists, violinists, and pianists in support of Ukrainian refugees.
