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New York · Nonprofit

FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC

FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC (New York) receives grants from 49 organizations whose IRS filings report $43,959,234 to it, the largest being CORPORATION FOR PUBLIC BROADCASTING ($14,607,800). 21 of them have funded it in more than one year.

Revenue FY2025
$8.3M
Funders on record
49
Grants received
$44M
Net assets
$15M
21/49 repeat fundersgrants exceed reported revenue in one year
01What it does

What Firelight Media Inc does

Mission

Firelight media's mission is to provide filmmakers mentorship, funding, and creative development to support the creation, distribution, and impact of documentary media by and about communities of color in all our vibrance and complexity.

As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.

Program

  1. Since its inception, firelight media has supported 250+ documentary filmmakers through our fellowship and grant programs, 100+ documentary feature films have been funded through our documentary lab, 40+ documentary short films have been produced, and 15 documentary feature films have been co-produced and distributed for public media in recent years.

    $5,501,035 spentof which $697,500 as grants$2,281,057 earned by the program
    100% of program spending

The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $5,501,035.

02The organization over time

The organization over time

Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.

100 = 20172017 Revenue 100 ($3.8M) Expenses 100 ($2.1M) Net assets 100 ($3.5M)2018 Revenue 99 ($3.8M) Expenses 122 ($2.5M) Net assets 137 ($4.8M)2019 Revenue 77 ($3.0M) Expenses 132 ($2.7M) Net assets 145 ($5.1M)2020 Revenue 88 ($3.4M) Expenses 155 ($3.2M) Net assets 169 ($5.9M)2021 Revenue 132 ($5.1M) Expenses 182 ($3.7M) Net assets 221 ($7.7M)2022 Revenue 289 ($11M) Expenses 307 ($6.3M) Net assets 357 ($13M)2023 Revenue 170 ($6.5M) Expenses 353 ($7.2M) Net assets 367 ($13M)2024 Revenue 219 ($8.4M) Expenses 330 ($6.8M) Net assets 415 ($15M)2025 Revenue 217 ($8.3M) Expenses 349 ($7.2M) Net assets 414 ($15M)
'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24'25
Revenue (217)Expenses (349)Net assets (414)Peer revenue range

Balance sheet

Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2021 to 2022, from $9.4M to $15M (+59%).

$4.0M
$5.4M
$5.5M
$7.0M
$9.4M
$15M
$15M
$16M
$15M
'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24'25
Total assetsTotal liabilities

How it's funded, over time

Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.

2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
2024
2025
ContributionsProgram revenueInvestmentOther

Government-grant reliance: 2018 0% · 2019 1% · 2020 8% · 2021 4% · 2022 2% · 2023 33% · 2024 7%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.

72% of FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC’s revenue is contributions — more earned-revenue than three-quarters of its peers (97% for the typical peer).

This organization
Typical peer · 1,024 orgs

Surplus & reserves

Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 1 of the last 9 reported years ran a deficit.

$1.8M
’17
$1.3M
’18
$266k
’19
$183k
’20
$1.3M
’21
$4.8M
’22
−$731k
’23
$1.6M
’24
$1.1M
’25
7.0
months of
reserve

Leadership and staff

The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.

Board chair

Anne Canty

Board chair

As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.

'17'18'19'20'21'22'23'24'25
Listed8986711121215
Joined·+1+0+0+1+5+3+1+3
No longer listed·01201210
03Who funds it

Who funds it, year by year

2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 7 funders to 16 funders, grant income fell $5.9M → $4.5M.

9 of 49 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 10% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.

From the IRS filings of FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 49 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.

How concentrated its funding is

FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC leans on a few funders — its largest provides 33% of grant income and the top three 64%; half comes from just 2 funders.

the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 2 funders to its left

46% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC.

33%
largest funder
64%
top three
~6
effective funders

Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 59% · 2018 40% · 2019 43% · 2020 20% · 2021 65% · 2022 34% · 2023 26% — diversifying over time.

“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.

How long its funders stay

37% of FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 43% give in more than one year at all.

first grant+1y+2y+3y+4y+5y+6y

Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.

Where its funders are

FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC draws 61% of its grant income from funders outside New York, across 11 states in all.

MN
IL
NY
MA
PA
NJ
CT
CA
VA
DC
HI

In-state vs out-of-state, by year

’17
’18
’19
’20
’21
’22
’23
New York out of state home

Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $4.5M arriving through sponsors registered in 8 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.

04Its place in the field

Against its field

FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC runs a healthier operating margin than half of the 431 civil rights nonprofits its size.

Operating margin14% · above the median
Months of reserve7.0mo · above the median
Revenue growth (annualized)10% · below the median

this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 431 civil rights nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025

Government funding FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC receives

Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $3.9M on record.

Federal$3.9M
grants $3.9Mcontracts $0
17
18
20
21
22
23
24
Top agencies
  • National Endowment for the Humanities$3.7M
  • National Endowment for the Arts$165k

Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.

Organizations like FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC

Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.

In New York

Nationally

05Profile & governance

Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.

Where the money goes

77% of spending goes to programs.

Program 77%Management 18%Fundraising 5%

Governance

8
board members
75%
independent
✓Conflict-of-interest policy✓Whistleblower policy✓Document retention✓Board reviewed the 990✓Audited financials

Public support

69%

Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.

Footprint & structure

Files a return copy in 1 state

NY

Screen this organization

A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.

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Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf

Questions and answers

Who funds FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC?
FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC (New York) receives grants from 49 organizations whose IRS filings report $43,959,234 to it, the largest being CORPORATION FOR PUBLIC BROADCASTING ($14,607,800). 21 of them have funded it in more than one year.
How many funders does FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC have?
IRS filings report 49 organizations giving $43,959,234 in grants to FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC, 21 of which have funded it in more than one year.
Who is the largest funder of FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC?
CORPORATION FOR PUBLIC BROADCASTING is the largest funder on record, with $14,607,800 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
How can an organization like FIRELIGHT MEDIA INC find more funders?
Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in New York. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.

These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2017–2025), and the filings of 49 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing