The Water Well Trust, the national nonprofit helping Americans get access to a clean, safe water supply, has received a grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Household Water Well Systems program for a project to increase potable water availability to rural households in ten Alabama counties.
The USDA grant and matching funds from the Water Systems Council will be used to fund Water Well Trust projects in ten Alabama counties, including Bullock, Barbour, Dallas, Hale, Lowndes Macon, Montgomery, Perry, Pike and Wilcox.
The grant monies will provide long-term, low-interest loans to applicants seeking new or improved water wells in the targeted Alabama counties. The Water Well Trust limits funding to a maximum of $11,000 per household. Loans have an interest rate of 1% with terms of up to 20 years.
To qualify for a WWT loan, applicants must be the owner and occupant of the home as their primary residence and must not have access to a public water supply. The applicant’s household income must not exceed 100% of the median non-metropolitan household income for the state in which the applicant resides. The 2019 non-metropolitan median household income is $51,500 for Alabama. The income criteria apply to both the applicant and all other occupants of the home.
Prospective applicants can apply online or 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.
This is the sixth USDA grant received by the Water Well Trust since 2014. In the past five years, USDA grant monies have been used to increase potable water availability to rural households in Arkansas, Oklahoma, Georgia, South Carolina, New Mexico and New York. Visit our News and Projects pages for more information.
