How Public Lab is Funded
The funders listed below support the Public Lab nonprofit organization. Other Public Lab community members and project partners have received funding from different organizations which are not listed below. Public Lab also creates earned revenue through sales of open hardware kits in the Civic Information Starter Kit program area.
2015
John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, Knight News Challenge
* $167,000 ($350,000 awarded over two years, beginning in 2014) Support for the Homebrew Sensing Project
The 11th Hour Project, a program of the Schmidt Family Foundation
* $120,000 ($230,000 awarded over two years, beginning in 2014) Support for community development of low cost tool for monitoring sand frac operations and pilot testing of tool
* $50,000 Support of DIY water turbidity monitoring in communities affected by frac sand mining
Autodesk Foundation * $100,000 General operating support
Foundation to Promote Open Society, a part of the Open Society Foundations
* $75,000 ($150,000 awarded over two years, beginning in 2014) Support for launching the Public Lab data advocacy initiative
Claneil Foundation Emerging Leaders Fund
* $60,000 ($200,000 awarded over four years, beginning in 2015) General operating support
Rita Allen Foundation
* $50,000 ($150,000 awarded over three years beginning in 2015) Support for a snapshot evaluation of Public Lab and development of an evaluation framework for co-created citizen science projects in partnership with UC-Davis
Rackspace
* $24,000 In-kind donation of server space for MapKnitter.org and Public Lab Archive
Robert Rauschenberg Foundation
* $5,000 General operating support
Microsoft
* $4,000 In support of our spring 2015 Barnraising in Chicago, IL
MapBox
* $4,000 In support of our spring 2015 Barnraising in Chicago, IL
Ashoka
* Recognition of Executive Director Shannon Dosemagen as an Ashoka Fellow
We'd also like to thank the following supporters who are going above and beyond in 2015!
Heeja Yoo-Warren, Tim Regan, ELGEA Inc, Cindy Regalado and Ted Fjallman, Karan Wood, and the Captain Planet Foundation.
2014
John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, Knight News Challenge - $183,000 ($350,000 awarded over two years, beginning in 2014) Support for the Homebrew Sensing Project
The 11th Hour Project, a program of the Schmidt Family Foundation - $110,000 ($230,000 awarded over two years, beginning in 2014) Support for community development of low cost tool for monitoring sand frac operations and pilot testing of tool
Foundation to Promote Open Society, a part of the Open Society Foundations - $75,000 ($150,000 awarded over two years, beginning in 2014) Support for launching the Public Lab data advocacy initiative
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency - $52,185 To train community members and wetland restoration advocates to monitor and track progress at eight ongoing urban wetland restoration projects near Lake Pontchartrain.
Rita Allen Foundation - $50,000 General support
New World Foundation - $25,600 (In partnership with Northeastern University Social Science and Environmental Health Research Institute) Preparing crowdsource disaster response to fracking emergencies
Rackspace - $24,000 In-kind donation of server space for MapKnitter.org and Public Lab Archive
Passport Foundation - $20,000 Support for indoor air quality monitoring project
Betsy and Jesse Fink Foundation - $15,000 General support
Raspberry Pi Foundation - $13,000 Support for development of curriculum around near-infrared imaging
New Knowledge Foundation Ltd. - $3,000 Partnership support on behalf of their EECapacity Project, an effort funded by the U. S. Environmental Protection Agency through a cooperative agreement with Cornell University, in collaboration with the North American Association for Environmental Education under Assistant Agreement No. NT-83497401-0
Mozilla Open News - $1,000 Support for ProPublica/Public Lab mapping in Louisiana
We'd also like to thank the following supporters who went above and beyond in 2014! Hank Boschen, Glorianna Davenport, Illah Nourbakhsh, Eugene Ruenger, Heeja Yoo-Warren, and William Dosemagen.
2013
Kickstarter (crowdfunded) - $71,373 - 1,556 backers Infragram: the Infrared Photography Project
MakerBot In-kind donation of ten MakerBot Replicator1 3D printers
Environmental Leadership Program (through the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation) - $10,000 Support for joint proposal to develop a community urban garden management toolkit with Ironbound Community Corporation in New Jersey
John S. and James L. Knight Foundation - $10,000 Support for 2013 Public Lab Barnraising
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency - $10,000 Air Quality Monitoring program for Cypress Hills school in Brooklyn, NY
John S. and James L. Knight Foundation - $10,000 Match for 1,000 backers on Infragram Kickstarter
Points of Light Civic Accelerator - $10,000 Investment in development of Civic Information Starter Kit program
Patagonia - $9,000 Gulf Coast Restoration - monitoring wetlands through community-led aerial imaging
Rackspace - $2,000 Support for 2013 Public Lab Barnraising
2012
John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, Knight News Challenge- $200,000 ($500,000 awarded over two years, beginning in 2011) General support
Kickstarter (crowdfunded) - $110,538 - 1,633 backers Public Lab DIY Spectrometry Kit
Kickstarter (crowdfunded) - $34,646 - 463 backers Balloon Mapping Kits
DenizenMedia.org - $3,250 Balloon Mapping Kits, 2 day workshop, remote support
Environmental Defense Fund - $2,500 Development of near-infrared imaging for agricultural use
iLab iLand - $1,000 Development of urban mapping workshop with iLand fellows
2011
John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, Knight News Challenge- $300,000 ($500,000 awarded over two years, beginning in 2011) General support
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Center for Civic Media- In-kind support Staff and research equipment support
National Affordable Housing Network, Butte, MT- In-kind support Butte site support
Shpilman Institute for Photography- $10,000 Evaluation of work at Gulf Coast, New York and Montana sites
UNICEF Rio- $4,500 To implement a week long training on aerial mapping in Rio de Janiero, Brazil
American Anthropological Association, Anthropology and Environment Section- $2,000 In support of hydrogen sulfide sensing tool development
DevelopmentSeed- $1,000 To support printing the July 2011 Wilkinson Bay Grassroots Mapping Forum
2010
Kickstarter (crowdfunded) - $8,285 - 145 backers Grassroots mapping the Gulf oil spill with balloons and kites
Awesome Foundation Boston- $1,000 Grassroots Mapping of the BP oil spill
Non-profit papers
Public Lab Tax Exemption Letter PublicLab_EIN_letter.pdf
Public Lab 2013 Financial Statements PublicLab_2013_990s.PDF (Audit available upon request)
Public Lab 2012 Financial Statements PublicLab_2012_990s.pdf (CPA review available upon request)
Public Lab 2011 Financial Statements Public_labs_990_2011-2012.pdf (CPA review available upon request)