The country's largest orphanage "Sonechko" in Zaporizhia has found itself at the epicenter of a scandal after an investigation into budget spending on an institution where there were virtually no children for most of the time. According to NGL.media , after the start of the full-scale Russian invasion, all the children were evacuated to the Lviv region, but most of the staff remained there, continuing to receive salaries and bonuses. Journalists claim that the state spent more than 230 million hryvnias on the maintenance of "Sonechko" during the period when the children's functions of the institution were performed by other institutions, and some of the children were officially re-registered in other regions.
According to the publication, at the time of the evacuation, 424 employees worked in the orphanage. A significant part of the staff was on "idle leave", receiving at least two-thirds of their salary, and some employees periodically came to the children's temporary place of residence in the Lviv region on a shift basis. At the same time, as the authors of the investigation note, the main amount of care and expenses for the children fell on other institutions and charitable organizations, while the amounts allocated from the Lviv regional budget for their maintenance turned out to be significantly less than the payments to the Sonechka staff.
During 2022–2025, 263 children were transported from Zaporizhia to Lviv region, of which 146 later found family forms of upbringing. At the same time, the total budget of "Sonechka" for this period is estimated at about 297 million hryvnias, and approximately 233 million hryvnias were spent on salaries and bonuses for staff. The material also mentions that in September 2024 alone, bonuses amounted to more than 800 thousand hryvnias, and some employees were paid additional payments for holidays.
The question also arises that the children, although physically in new locations, remained officially registered in the Zaporizhzhia orphanage, which complicated the adoption and patronage procedures. The evacuation, as previously reported, began due to the lack of equipped shelters in the institution at the beginning of large-scale hostilities in 2022, so the transportation of children became a necessary security measure.
In December 2024, the Zaporizhzhia OVA announced the closure of "Sonechka", and in June 2025 the orphanage was officially liquidated. Part of the functions of the institution were transferred to the Zaporizhzhia Regional Children's Clinical Hospital. The director of the regional health department, Viktoria Klymenko, reported that the children were distributed to other boarding schools and social departments, and the employees were recommended to look for other employment options. The former head of "Sonechka" Liliya Filipska, in her comments, called the situation painful and summed up that the institution no longer functions in its former format.
