Utah and Africa may seem to be half a world apart, but they share a common concern — water.
A group of employees from Clearlink, a Salt Lake City-based website and content management company, passed through Tooele City today on their way from Las Vegas to Salt Lake City.
More than 300 employees from the company have trekked a portion of the nearly 500-mile route between the two desert cities to raise awareness of the shortage of safe drinking water in Africa — and to Utah’s own water shortage, as well.
“We came across a bunch of stats that people in Africa walk 40 billion hours a year to get water,” said Tarah Reeves, public relations director for Clearlink and the employee responsible for organizing the walk. “We wanted to walk through some dry, arid places to help us relate to literally walking for our water.”
Clearlink employees who wanted to take part in the exercise joined teams that, in addition to walking a 15-mile segment of the route between Las Vegas and Salt Lake, were also responsible for raising funds to support the construction of a municipal water system in Rwanda, Reeves said. Altogether the teams raised more than $40,000 with bake sales, social media campaigns, sports tournaments, and other charitable efforts.
The idea for the walk came from Clearlink CEO Phil Hansen, who had attended a lecture on charitable efforts to relieve the water crisis in Africa, Reeves said. He partnered with Charity Water, an international organization that is currently working with government officials in Rwanda to provide the African country with a sustainable water system, and then invited his own employees to join the cause.
“He [Hansen] felt water was something he needed to help bring to others, since water is a resource that is so close to home,” Reeves said.
Additionally, Reeves said, the walk gave Clearlink “employees a chance to get involved with a unique project to give them purpose outside their jobs.”
But the walk not only built company unity. Reeves said the employees who participated learned something for themselves about water conservation as they spread the word about the short availability of clean water in Africa.
“I think out of all of this, everyone is a little more conscious of their water usage at home,” she said. “It’s made us want to help make Utah a little less dry.”
The company intends to complete their walk and fundraiser — which kicked off on Sept. 27 — tomorrow, with a final group walk from Saltaire to the company’s headquarters near the Salt Lake International Airport and with a company-wide celebration of clean water.