Need for Drinking Water
After meeting with leaders of Food for the Hungry/Striking out Poverty (“FH”) and La Estancia, it was determined providing access to clean and affordable drinking water was the highest priority need for the residents. While the village had older water treatment equipment it was no longer providing acceptable drinking water for residents and had been shut down.
La Estancia residents had to purchase drinking water at local retail stores, placing a financial burden on them in order to satisfy a basic necessity – this did not seem right to us. Repairing the existing facility was not a feasible alternative and building a new water treatment facility was an expensive project, with a price tag of approximately $60,000.
Swinging for Good (“SFG”) stepped up to the plate and committed the money to fully fund the water treatment facility. However, we quickly learned that building a new state of the art reverse osmosis water treatment facility, was a not a simple task and money alone could not solve the issue.
FH and SFG worked together to find available and appropriate land to accommodate the equipment and facility. When we visited La Estancia, we scouted out several locations in the village that could be purchased, but most failed to be appropriate. We ran into issues regarding legal title of land and logistic issues (available land located to far from most residents, etc.). One location that seemed to be ideal was on the grounds of La Estancia’s school. It was centrally located on the main road and central to the daily lives of most families of La Estancia. However, we were told that it was not a viable option because school land is owned by the federal government in the Dominican Republic, not the town.
After evaluating alternate locations, we kept coming back to the attractiveness of building it on the school’s premises. SFG, La Estancia and FH, worked with the school district and subsequently petitioned the Ministry of Education (MoE) to make it a reality. In addition to working together to find a suitable location, Swinging for Good’s commitment to fund the entire project was critical because petitioning the MoE and having a permit issued to build the facility, created a commitment with the MoE that required assurances that the project was funded and would be executed.
A new state of the art water treatment facility is now in the process of becoming a reality for the residents of La Estancia.