Funding

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The Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism is a nonprofit, nonpartisan 501(c)3 organization that is primarily funded through grants and donations from foundations and individuals. A smaller amount of its revenue is earned through production of commissioned reports.

The Center’s first major grant, a gift of $100,000, was awarded by the Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation in 2009.

The Oklahoma-based foundation continued to support the Center with grants of $100,000 in 2010 and $100,000 in 2011.

In 2010, the Center received a two-year $75,000 matching grant from Challenge Fund for Journalism VI, a joint program of the Ford Foundation in New York, the McCormick Foundation in Illinois and the Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation.

The Foundation to Promote Open Society, which works in cooperation with the Open Society Institute in New York City, awarded the Center $50,000 in 2009 and $100,000 in 2010 (to be spread over two years).

The Center also is grateful for contributions it received from the Peters Family Foundation in Utah in 2009, 2010 and 2011; the Evjue Foundation in Madison in 2009, 2010 and 2011; and the Wisconsin State Journal in 2009.

All members of the Center’s Board of Directors, who serve as volunteers, are financial supporters of the organization.

The Center has received revenue for producing reports through arrangements with the Center for Public Integrity, a nonprofit investigative news organization in Washington, D.C.; WBEZ Public Media in Chicago; and American University’s J-Lab: The Institute for Interactive Journalism.

In 2011, the Center announced a partnership with MAPLight.org to investigate the influence of money in Wisconsin state politics and policymaking. The project is supported by the Open Society Institute. The Center expects to receive about $25,000 for this project in 2011 and a similar amount in the first half of 2012.

Additional donors

Susan Applegate

Appleton Post-Crescent Community Fund

Herman Baumann

Tom Bier

Malcolm Brett

Jim Burgess

Ned Cochrane and Bonnie Cox

John Daigle

James Danky

Robert Dreps and Betty Koehl

Fund for Environmental Journalism