Stepove Territorial Community

The Stepove rural territorial community is managed by Viktor Fediuk, Secretary of the Village Council. To date, two school buses have been purchased for the organization of the educational process.The workers of the outpatient clinic were given a car, which was purchased thanks to the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and with the support of individual donors from the Kingdom of the Netherlands. This will make it possible to introduce a universally progressive model of home visits to improve the provision of medical and social care.Also, the community received diesel generators as humanitarian aid for uninterrupted operation of communal enterprises that provide services of centralized water drainage to the population.

The Stepove rural territorial community was created in November 2019.

The village of Stepove is a former German settlement of Karlsruhe formed in 1811. Later it was called the village of Kalestrovo. The settlement was part of the German Berezan colonist district as part of the Odesa district of the Kherson province.

There are architectural monuments on the territory of the community. The Church of Saints Peter and Paul is one of the oldest of them.

The first Catholic church was built in Stepove in 1820-30s. It was made of limestone and straw. The new Church of Saints Peter and Paul in the neo-Gothic style appeared in 1881-1885. In 1934, the top of the belfry and the tower were demolished by the communists, but during the occupation period the tower on the temple was still restored. During the Second World War, when the Soviet troops attacked, almost all the bell towers were destroyed from the air.

Today, the Church of Saints Peter and Paul requires renovation. 18 kilometers from Stepove, in the village of Novoselivka, another Roman Catholic church has been preserved – the Church of Anthony of Padua, built in 1893. Today it is an abandoned, dilapidated building, which in the Soviet period served as a collective farm storeroom.

At the moment, the community is collecting information, surveying residents’ wishes and filling out tables for the preparation of the development strategy of the Stepove territorial community for 2024-2027.

Recently, the second meeting of the working group took place, where they considered the youth questionnaire, worked in groups, wrote the strengths and weaknesses of the community, analyzed the indicators

The community is rich in forests, chornozems and minerals. Also, there is a deposit of sawn limestone and a quarry of local materials – sand, gravel, clay.

In the community, there is an industrial company, V TERMO – BUD, which is engaged in the production of sandwich panels (for walls, roofs).Agriculture is the main branch of the community in terms of production and population employment.

The main areas of agriculture are the cultivation of grain and industrial crops. Some agricultural enterprises are engaged in breeding and keeping livestock.There are 10 institutions of general secondary education operating in the community: 6 lyceums, 2 gymnasiums and 2 primary schools. About 1,000 pupils study there. School buses provide transportation of children to schools.There are also 9 preschool education institutions, attended by about 300 children and employing 30 teachers.Medical care in the community is provided by three outpatient clinics and 8 health centers.

• Website of the Stepove Village Council