As an independent, civic news organization, we rely on the generous support of individual donors and foundations to power our journalism for West Virginians. When you make a gift to Mountain State Spotlight, your money goes toward paying our Charleston-based staff and ensuring our reporters have the support they need to do in-depth reporting about issues in our state.
To date, we’re proud to have raised money from more than 900 supporters — both in West Virginia and around the U.S. and world — who champion our mission and believe in the power of local accountability journalism.
As an organization, we are committed to transparency regarding disclosing our major donors, corporate sponsors, and foundation support. Here are our 990 tax returns for 2020 and 2021. Below is a list of our major funders from March 1, 2020 through Dec. 31, 2022.
Foundations/Institutional supporters
American Journalism Project
Arnold Ventures
Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation
A donation sent anonymously from the Community Foundation of Louisville
Emerson Collective
The Ford Foundation
Galloway Family Foundation
The Henry Kimelman Family Foundation
Inasmuch Foundation
Miller-Wehrle Family Foundation
The Paul J. Nyden Family Fund for Social Justice
ProPublica
Report for America
States Newsroom
Major individual donors
Sarah and Ben Bailey Family Fund
Stuart Calwell
Martha and Will Carter
Brian Glasser
Bill Bishop & Julia Ardery
Greg Moore
Appalachian Mountain Advocates, in memory of Sean McGinley
Alexis Pugh
Katy White
We also offer our work for free to media outlets around West Virginia, and we’re thrilled to count these organizations among our publishing partners:
100 Days in Appalachia
The Barbour Democrat
Beckley Register-Herald
The Doddridge Independent
Grant County Press
Hinton News
The Journal
The Mineral Daily News-Tribune
The Monroe Watchman
My Buckhannon
The Observer
Point Pleasant Register
The Pocahontas Times
The Record Delta
Ritchie Gazette
Spencer News-Record
The Spirit of Jefferson
The Times West Virginian
WDTV
The Welch News
The West Virginian
West Virginia Daily News
West Virginia Public Broadcasting