Susie Nelson

Susie Nelson works every day to help fulfill philanthropic wishes. As Executive Director of the Community Foundation for the Ohio Valley (CFOV), she has the privilege of working with philanthropists of all types. Since 2007, Nelson has served as Executive Director of the CFOV, serving the Northern Panhandle of West Virginia and Eastern Ohio. The assets of the CFOV have increased by more than 50% under her leadership, comprising 240 individual charitable funds. In addition to working with donors, Nelson also spends time working with nonprofit leaders to assist them with finding and acquiring philanthropic resources from across the region and nation. In 2013, Nelson was awarded the Spirit of Philanthropy Award for Staff Leadership by West Virginia Grantmakers. In 2012, the CFOV, under Nelson’s leadership, was awarded the Spirit of Philanthropy Award for Critical Impact for the Women’s Giving Circle of the CFOV.

Nelson serves as Chairperson of the board of Philanthropy West Virginia. She also serves annually on the allocations panel for the United Way of the Upper Ohio Valley. Nelson is the former regional chair of Leave A Legacy of Central Appalachia. She is a former board member of Wheeling Health Right and the YWCA Wheeling, and former board president of the Children’s Museum of the Ohio Valley. She is a former President of the Rotary Club of Wheeling. Prior to Nelson’s work at the CFOV, she served as the Director of Marketing & Community Relations for the City of Wheeling where she marketed the city for economic development and worked to enhance summer events at Wheeling’s Heritage Port.

A wife and mother of two, Nelson graduated from West Virginia University in 1993.