The Water Well Trust, a national nonprofit helping low-income Americans get access to a clean, safe water supply, is partnering with The Chris Long Foundation and the Rural Community Assistance Partnership (RCAP) to create a new domestic water program called “Hometown H2o” with the support of corporate partners Xylem and Goulds Water Technologies.

Working with the Water Well Trust, “Hometown H20” will fund and drill water wells for low-income households that do not have access to water at home or within a reasonable distance. By raising funds to build individual wells and small, shared wells, Hometown H2O will be able to provide safe drinking water to American homes in need in one of the most cost-effective ways.

According to the latest American Community Survey, there are 460,000 households — or 1.5 million Americans — living without access to access to clean, safe and affordable drinking water.

Two-time Super Bowl Champion and 2018 NFL Walter Payton Man of the Year Chris Long said he is expanding the mission of his foundation’s Waterboys initiative to meet the needs of Americans without access to a clean, safe drinking water supply.

“It’s always been a passion of mine to connect our work abroad with our work domestically,” says Long. “We are committed to making a huge difference domestically and will focus on the water issues that affect primarily rural, impoverished communities.”

Waterboys unites professional NFL and NBA athletes and fans from across the world in support of a single, shared cause: providing clean, accessible drinking water to 1 million people. To date, Waterboys has raised more than $4 million with the help of over 45 professional athletes, providing clean drinking water to more than 330,000 people in East Africa.

Hometown H2O will also join forces with RCAP’s Agua4All program to ensure students and teachers in rural communities have access to safe drinking water by installing water bottle filling stations and filtration stations in schools and other community-centered places.

In addition, water technology company Xylem and its corporate social responsibility program, Watermark, will provide financial and product support for the Hometown H2o initiative through its Goulds Water Technology brand.

“This partnership will provide fantastic new resources for meeting the needs of Americans without access to clean, safe water,” says Water Well Trust program director Margaret Martens. “The Trust has a long waiting list of families who have been hanging on for years, hoping for this kind of help. For them, every day without water is a struggle. Hometown H2o will help us fulfill the promise of a better life for these American families much more quickly.”

The Water Well Trust maintains a wait list of American households requesting funding for the drilling of new wells or rehabilitation of non-functioning wells in high-need, low-resource rural areas. Prospective applicants can download the application form and instruction letter from the Water Well Trust website.

The Water Systems Council established the Water Well Trust in 2010 to provide clean, sanitary drinking water to Americans who lack access to a reliable water supply and to construct and document small community water systems using water wells to demonstrate that these systems are more economical. For more information, visit waterwellltrust.org.