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Akers Foundation at a glance

· Private foundation

Akers Foundation

Its FY2024 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.

$339k
Granted FY2024still arriving
3
Grants FY2024still arriving
1
States reached
$313k
Largest
01What it fundsRead
02The needRead
03Its granteesRead
04Its fieldRead
01What it funds
01100% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2017 to 2024.

Health$1.5MArts & Culture$53kEducation$46kPhilanthropy$42kEnvironment$21kYouth Development$14kCivil Rights$10k
02FY2024 · 3 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

By grant size · FY2024

  • Under $10k1 grant · $1k
  • $10k–50k1 grant · $25k
  • $250k+1 grant · $313k
$25,000
Median grant
1
States reached
$188k
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL COLORADO FOUNDATION$313,238
THE COLORADO GRAND INC$25,000
THE BISON FOUNDATION$1,200
02The need
03

Does the money reach high-need areas?

Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, against the area’s typical level.

show:

Its human-services grants (FY21–24, $24k) land where the poverty rate runs at 12%, against an area that typically sits at 9%. 100% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of its grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

area typical 9%The Bison Foundation: $9k → 12%THE BISON FOUNDATION: $8k → 12%THE BISON FOUNDATION: $7k → 12%THE BISON FOUNDATION: $1k → 12%0%20%40%50%more need →
grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount
How this is measured
Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty line in the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP.
How this is measured
US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are delivered. Need from public data (U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA), shown as context about the area, never attributed to the funder’s giving.
03Its grantees
repeat funding

Who it funds again

Organizations funded in more than one year, against those funded once.

97%of every dollar goes to organizations it has funded before.
$1.7M · 6 repeat orgs$51k to everyone else

Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +64% since the first grant, against +33% for those funded once.

6 repeat relationships: 3 still active in FY2024, 3 since wound down.

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

6
8

Total granted

$1.7M
$51k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+64%
+33%

Still filing today

100%
75%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2024, 100% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $0 went to new ones.

50%100%’17’18’19’20’21’22’23’24
RenewedFirst-time

Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant

’17’18’19’20’21’22’23’24
HealthEducationPhilanthropyCommunity ImprovementHuman ServicesYouth DevelopmentOther
How this is measured
First-time means a grantee’s first year in the filing window; renewed means funded in an earlier year too. The renewed share climbs naturally as a portfolio matures, so the signal is a year that bucks it (a wave of new grantees). The earliest year is left-censored: relationships that predate the data read as new. Theme is the grantee’s IRS cause.

Backed again, and grew

  • CH
    Children's Hospital Colorado Foundation
    5× · 2020–2024 · $1.4M · revenue +26%
  • CH
    Children's Hospital Colorado
    2× · 2018–2019 · $147k · revenue +64%
  • CG
    COLORADO GRAND INC
    3× · 2022–2024 · $53k · revenue +56%

Funded once

  • IG
    Individual grant recipient
    one grant, 2021 · $16k
  • BB
    BIG BROTHERSBIG SISTERS OF MIDDLE TNgraduated
    one grant, 2017 · $10k · revenue +73%
  • BP
    BRIDGE PROJECT
    one grant, 2018 · $10k
How this is measured

Repeat means funded in two or more distinct years. Growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.

04Its field

Closest unfunded matches

The nonprofits that most resemble its grantees but are not funded by it, scored along the direction from the rest of the field toward the portfolio. A resemblance in what they say they do, not a recommendation.

1
The Colorado Health Foundation
Health
2
Colorado Solar Energy Industries Assoc

Our mission is to expand solar and storage markets and to generate jobs and prosperity for the people of Colorado. Together with hundreds of solar and storage business members we work to advance clean energy policies, remove market…

—
3
Colorado Dental Association Foundation

The CDA Foundation advances access to oral healthcare through charitable giving, supports the future of the profession through dental school scholarships and promotes dental professional wellbeing.

Health
4
Colorado Health Institute
Health
5
Colorado Wildlife Heritage Foundation Inc

The mission of the Colorado Wildlife Heritage Foundation is to provide a legacy for Colorado through support of environmental stewardship conservation of wildlife and the protection of critical habitat.

Animals
6
The Colorado Trust
Philanthropy
7
Colorado Petroleum Association

Promotion of the exploration, production, refining, and marketing of oil and natural gas.

Community Improvement
8
Colorado Access Foundation
Health
9
Community Foundation Serving Southwest Colorado

To develop and increase charitable giving that connects donors to community needs in Southwest Colorado and to support the nonprofit sector through granting and educational opportunities.

Philanthropy
10
The Elway Foundation
—
11
The Colorado Parks Foundation Inc
Recreation & Sports
12
Columbine Community Foundation

The Grand Foundation is a philanthropic organization serving all of Grand County, Colorado. The Foundation seeks to improve the quality of life in Grand County by proactively addressing current and future needs in the areas of Health &…

Philanthropy
How this is measured
The grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Children's Hospital Colorado Foundation; the most unlike its peers is 300SL Foundation. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
04the grantee network

12 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2025.

Each grant beside the grantee’s revenue from every source, year by year.

How this is measured

Counted here: distinct organizations funded across 2017 to 2025, not grant rows in a single year, so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 12 of the 14 grantees resolved in that span have returns of their own we could reconcile.

Each grantee is resolved to its own IRS returns. Association, dated; never a causal claim.

0
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
3
Early backer (in before they grew)
12/12
Grantees still filing
11/12
Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

Children's Hospital Colorado Foundation: $1,395,466 · HealthChildren's Hospital Colorado FoundationChildren's Hospital Colorado: $147,015 · HealthChildren's Hospital ColoradoCOLORADO GRAND INC: $52,500 · OtherIndividual grant recipient: $16,000 · OtherBRIDGE PROJECT: $9,548 · OtherThe Mile High Five Foundation: $4,000 · Other+1 more: $1,000 · OtherALLIANCE FOR CHOICE IN EDUCATION: $40,000 · EducationUNIVERSITY OF DENVER: $5,500 · EducationTHE BISON FOUNDATION: $24,200 · Human ServicesColorado Energy Foundation: $20,100 · Community ImprovementBIG BROTHERSBIG SISTERS OF MIDDLE TN: $10,000 · Youth DevelopmentTennessee Kidney Foundation Inc: $2,500 · Philanthropy300SL Foundation: $2,000 · Philanthropy
Health$1,542,481Other$83,048Education$45,500Human Services$24,200Community Improvement$20,100Youth Development$10,000Philanthropy$4,500

Each grantee by its size and the funder’s share of it; top left is load-bearing

25%50%75%100%$1.0M$10M$100Mgrantee revenue →↑ funder's share of their budgetChildren's Hospital Colorado Foundation: $1,395,466 over 5y, 0.7% of budgetChildren's Hospital Colorado: $147,015 over 2y, 0.0% of budgetCOLORADO GRAND INC: $52,500 over 3y, 2.1% of budgetALLIANCE FOR CHOICE IN EDUCATION: $40,000 over 2y, 0.1% of budgetTHE BISON FOUNDATION: $24,200 over 4y, 4.9% of budgetColorado Energy Foundation: $20,100 over 3y, 5.0% of budgetBIG BROTHERSBIG SISTERS OF MIDDLE TN: $10,000 over 1y, 0.4% of budgetUNIVERSITY OF DENVER: $5,500 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetThe Mile High Five Foundation: $4,000 over 1y, 4.9% of budget300SL Foundation: $2,000 over 1y, 0.3% of budgetColorado Oil & Gas Association: $1,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budget
Grantee by grantee: a decade per organization, before and after funding

A decade per grantee: revenue shaded, grants as bars, all rows on one timeline.

Co-funders

Grantmakers whose grantees overlap with this funder’s far more than size alone predicts. Closer means stronger alignment; arcs show where they also fund each other. Here they form a tightly interlocked group: most of these funders back each other's grantees too.

Donor Advised Charita…Fidelity Investments …Amazonsmile Foundation
Donor Advised Charitable Giving IncCO4.6× affinity4 shared granteesties to 2 of 2Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund · Amazonsmile Foundation

How this is measured
Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. Overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.

How much its grantees rely on government

Each dot is one organization Akers Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from Akers Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.

2023
’20’21’22’23’24’25
no gov · 00%0%1%3%5%funder's share of their income ↑0%3%5%8%10%share of the org’s income from government →
    no gov moneyreceives it· size = income
    0get no government money at all
    3report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)
    0rely on government for over half their income
    ⤢ axis zoomed · 0–10%
    typical government reliance, FY20–25
    How this is measured
    Government income is each org’s traced federal awards (USASpending grants and contracts) plus state payments (open checkbooks) as a share of its total revenue (IRS Form 990); the self-reported government-grant line (990 line 1e) is carried for cross-check: a grantee that reports government grants we could not trace to a source is left off the chart rather than shown as receiving none. An association, not a claim that a grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first, a floor rather than a census; state records exist for 9 states, so a grantee outside them shows no state figure (dimmed) rather than a false zero. Federal award amounts are obligations, which can span years, so a single-year share is indicative. 990 filings lag 12 to 24 months.

    On method. Every financial figure here is read from IRS e-file XML, the funder’s own 990/990-PF, and from the multi-year returns of the 14 grantees we resolved, each linked to its source. Grantee outcomes are each organization’s own program-service reporting (Form 990, Part III), read as association with funding, never as caused by it. Low-confidence name matches are suppressed rather than guessed. How we build these →

    How this is measured
    Each figure carries one of six labels. Filed is what the funder reported on its return. Official is another government record about an organization, such as a federal award or a charity register, joined by name where no shared identifier exists. Resolved is an identity we worked out where the filing named a recipient without an EIN, kept only above a measured confidence threshold. Computed is arithmetic over those, like themes, portfolio clusters and co-funder strength. Context is a statistic about a place rather than about an organization, which is what the need overlay is: it describes the area a grantee’s address sits in, not where its work lands. Inferred is drawn by a model from text, like the partnerships read out of public news and organization websites. Each is labeled where it appears.

    Generated from the IRS Form 990-PF e-file return for fiscal year 2024, released 2024. Filings run roughly 12 to 24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

    Source object · view filing

    Play a game based on Akers’ filings →

    More from the funding graph

    The unnamed billions
    grants reported with no recipient in the public record
    The regranting layer
    51% of grant dollars land in the regranting layer
    The DAF merry-go-round
    $9.7B circulates between donor-advised funds
    The endowment market
    who holds foundation money, and what just moved
    The camps
    funders cluster by geography, not ideology
    By state
    where grant money is based, and what stays home