An initiative of the Mathews Community Foundation, Water for Everyone, is bringing relief to Mathews County residents who lack access to clean drinking water.
Led by Ron Lambert, a past community foundation chairman, Water for Everyone is upgrading water systems at four sites in the county to provide fresh, clean drinking water, free of charge, to anyone, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Once those four systems are completed, Mathews Rotary Club will take on the initiative with a goal of upgrading eight additional systems around the county.
Private water systems are not routinely tested for bacteria, said Lambert, but ultraviolet light treatment will be used in the systems to kill any bacteria that may be in the water.
The first system has been completed by the company WaterPro at West Mathews Community League’s civic center in Bohannon. Following close behind will be systems at the Piankatank Ruritan Club at Hudgins, Mathews Chapel United Methodist Church at Cobbs Creek, and Ocean Products in Diggs, all of which are expected to be up and running by the middle of August.
These first four systems are being paid for with a $21,000 grant from the Mathews County Against Poverty Fund at the MCF, and chairman Bill Whitley said in an email that the foundation is excited to partner with Hands Across Mathews and the Rotary Club to provide funding to get the Water for Everyone project started. One of the reasons the foundation was created was to improve the quality of life and health of people who live in the county, he said.
“We find it distressing that in 2025 people in our county have to live without basic facilities for them to lead healthy lives,” said Whitley. “Over the last two years, we have worked with the Middle Peninsula Planning District Commission to help them address septic tank and drain field issues on Gwynn’s Island, and now we are working with the Mathews Rotary Club to provide drinking water for people throughout Mathews who do not have it at their homes.”
Rotary to step in
Lambert said that to pay for the remaining systems, Mathews Rotary Club, of which he is a member, is applying for grant funding through Rotary International’s Strategic Water Alliance, which has spent years placing sanitation and water stations in third world countries around the globe, primarily on the African continent.
With 30,000 clubs and 1.5 million members, Rotary International has one of the largest charitable funds in the world, said Lambert. Mathews Rotary submitted a proposal to the organization in June after Lambert, assisted by Rotarian Bill Stearns and members of Hands Across Mathews, spent months conducting a community assessment to determine the extent of the need in Mathews. The county should qualify, said Lambert, because 25 percent of the population receives some form of public assistance, and Mathews has no municipal water system. Additionally, most of the wells in Mathews are shallow because, contrary to many localities, the deeper a local well goes, the worse the water becomes. If awarded, he said, the Rotary International Global Grant would be one of only a few received by a community in the United States.
Lambert said his initial concept for the project was to install wells on county-owned property, but at almost $30,000 each, the cost would be prohibitive, and there was only one such property where a drill could be used.
“But there were wells already around the county,” he said. “We talked to people, and they were glad to have their property used.”
A problem
There’s just one problem, said Lambert. In order to qualify for the grant, Rotary needs to be able to determine the extent of the need for water in Mathews, and Lambert is having trouble getting people to say they don’t have water or that their water is bad and they can’t drink it.
Lambert is therefore asking that people contact Rotary by telephone or email and provide the status of their water system. He emphasized that they don’t need to give their name or address. All Rotary needs to know is what their water is like and the general area of the county they live in, such as Onemo or North, etc., so the club knows where water facilities need to be placed.
“It’s something that needs to be done,” said Lambert. “How can we allow this to happen in the United States of America, in Mathews County, where we have people without water? We have to do something about it.”
To provide information about the need for water in Mathews, call 804-993-1795 or email mathewsvawater@gmail.com.
Other initiatives
Water for Everyone is one of three projects currently being worked on by Mathews County Against Poverty. After the group was formed in December 2023, it held a community workshop to determine the most important issues to address in Mathews, and the three needs identified were affordable housing, child care and water.
On the affordable housing issue, the old rectory of Kingston Parish, which was close to being torn down, is now being renovated by a group of residents who stepped up and raised funds to create two apartments there for teachers and first responders, said Lambert. That group, called The Kingston Housing Initiative, is also behind the Water for Everyone initiative.
On the child care issue, the committee on childcare put together a plan for a center in Thomas Hunter Middle School, but that didn’t work out, so a fundraising campaign was launched to raise enough money to create a childcare preschool program for ages 2-4. The YMCA agreed to run it, Mathews Community Foundation funded half the cost, and Mathews Women’s Giving Circle provided additional significant funds, along with other private donors. The center will be opening next month at Westville Baptist Church on Main Street, complete with a new playground funded by Rotary’s annual Party with a Purpose and the White Family Fund.