Join The Source.
A small group of founding donors covers everything that isn't a well, so every dollar from everyone else builds one.
How it works
Most nonprofits split your donation between project costs and overhead, and call the overhead share small. We do it differently. We split the money at the structural level, into two separately funded pools.
Project costs
Drilling, casing, pumps, platforms, community engagement — are paid for entirely by general donors.
Everything else
Software, the website, US-side operations, airfare, administrative time, and the salaries of our local maintenance team in Ghana — is paid for by The Source, our founding group of donors.
This is what lets us tell new donors, honestly, that 100% of their gift builds wells. Not because we hide costs in a footnote. Because a different group of people is paying those costs, on purpose.
Why this matters
"100% to projects" is a phrase a lot of nonprofits use. Most of the time it isn't quite true — overhead gets reclassified, travel gets folded into project budgets. We didn't want to play that game. We also didn't want to under-invest in the operational work that makes the wells last. The Source is what lets us do both.
What joining means
The Source is small by design. It's the founding group that has carried SWP since the beginning, and it grows only when someone is genuinely committed to underwriting the work rather than funding a specific well.
If you join, you cover the operational costs most donors prefer not to fund. In return, you get a closer view into the organization than a typical donor — the financials, the trade-offs, the things that didn't work and why. We invite hard questions and answer them directly.
This isn't the right kind of giving for everyone. Most donors want their gift attached to a specific village. The Source is for the donors who understand that the unglamorous part of the work is what makes the rest possible.
Get in touch
If you're interested, send us a note. We'll walk you through the financials in detail before any commitment is made.