NAHANT — Good Hope Inc., a nonprofit organization aimed at helping the impoverished, has announced the 9th Annual Running and Walking Well 5k is scheduled for June 7, with the goal of raising funds to construct a well in the Lira District of Uganda.
The event will start at Nahant Life Saving Station on 96 Nahant Road at 9 a.m. sharp. There will also be activities for children (such as the 100-Yard Kid’s Dash), as well as a free lunch at 11 a.m. and a silent auction, which closes at 11:30 a.m., according to the press release.
Since its inception in 2014, the Running & Walking Well 5K has funded the construction of wells in Kenya, Tanzania, Ghana, Morocco and Zimbabwe. This year, however, proceeds will support a new well in Uganda to address the urgent need for clean drinking water in the Lira District.
Access to safe water is critical. Approximately 24% of Africa’s 1.37 billion people lack this essential resource, the press release noted, leading to preventable diseases and deaths, especially among children.
Good Hope, Inc. was founded in 2006 and is dedicated to improving health and growth opportunities for individuals and families by providing food, medical care, education, clean drinking water, and support for inmates both locally and globally.
Board member Leighton O’Connor explained the significance of the organization’s efforts to bring water to those in need.
“We started the 5k walk back in 2014, and since then, we’ve actually been able to build 11 wells in Africa,” O’Connor said. “I’ve actually gotten to go and see some of the wells a couple times, and we’ve dug wells in Tanzania, Ghana, Morocco, Kenya, and in 2023 I went on a trip to see six of the wells… Just to see that they were being taken care of properly and benefiting the communities it serves.”
He continued, “People have to walk three or four miles to get clean water in some places of the world — because the communities either don’t have water, or the water the community does have has been contaminated by livestock… I’ve seen what happens before wells are there and after — and there’s more crops, more schools, more livestock. It just changes a community.”
O’Connor talked about how he traveled to Moi’s Bridge, Kenya to make sure the well built in the area was working properly.
“I talked to one of the girls there, and I said, ‘How has this well changed your life?’ and she said, ‘Less of my friends are dying now,’ so they really have a great impact on the community,” O’Connor said. “When I went to visit the well a second time, I walked onto the property of one of the schools — and there were at least a hundred kids there, singing a song as I walked on the property, just for me.”
He said that it felt “incredible to have an impact like that so far away.”
O’Connor continued, “Think of it, we can just turn on the faucet or go to the store and get some water… That’s not the case in a lot of communities in Africa — you have to walk for it and plan around it.”
He reiterated that for those wishing to get involved, all they have to do is sign up to walk. “It’s really just a great chance to learn more about Good Hope,” he said. “It’s about passing along our good fortune to those in the world that aren’t as fortunate as us.”
