· Private foundation
Atticus Trust
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.
What you funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2018–2024.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2024
- $10k–50k5 grants · $102k
- $50k–250k2 grants · $325k
- $250k+2 grants · $608k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| URBAN GREEN LAB INC | $308,000 |
| ENVIRONMENTAL LAW INSTITUTE | $300,000 |
| SOUTHERN ENVIRONMENTAL LAW CENTER | $200,000 |
| NATURAL RESOURCES DEFENSE COUNCIL | $125,000 |
| ONE GENERATION AWAY | $30,000 |
| NASHVILLE PARKS FOUNDATION | $25,000 |
| SOCIETY OF ST ANDREW | $20,000 |
| TURNIP GREEN CREATIVE REUSE | $15,000 |
| NASHVILLE TREE FOUNDATION | $12,000 |
Do your dollars go where the need is?
Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, then read against the area’s typical level.
Your human-services grants (FY19–19, $2k) land where the poverty rate runs at 14%, against an area that typically sits at 10%. 100% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.
Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty linein the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP; grantee ZIP can differ from where services are delivered.
US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are actually delivered. Need from public data — U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA — shown as context about the area, never attributed to your giving.
Who you back again
Which organizations you funded more than once, and which you funded a single time. Each grantee is matched to its own filings.
21 repeat relationships — 9 still active in FY2024, 12 since wound down.
How the two cohorts compare
Organizations
Total granted
Median revenue growth · since first grant
Still filing today
New vs renewed · share of each year
In FY2024, 100% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $0 went to new ones.
Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant
First-time = a grantee’s first year in your filing window; renewed = funded in an earlier year too. As a portfolio matures the renewed share naturally climbs — once funded, an org stays “renewable” — so the signal is the years that buck it (a new-grantee intake wave). 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
- UGURBAN GREEN LAB4× · 2020–2024 · $1.1M · revenue +37% · 48% of their budget
- ELEnvironmental Law Institute5× · 2018–2024 · $1.1M · revenue +14%
NATURAL RESOURCES DEFENSE COUNCIL INC5× · 2020–2024 · $950k · revenue +26%
Funded once
- CCCHRIST CHURCH CATHEDRALone grant, 2019 · $516k
- NCNASHVILLE COMMUNITY BAIL BOND FUNDone grant, 2019 · $300k
- RIREFED INCgraduatedone grant, 2020 · $150k · revenue +55%
Repeat = funded in two or more distinct years; growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.
The map has a center of gravity: the average direction from the rest of the sector toward the organizations the foundation funds — the shape of its giving. Scoring every nonprofit along that direction surfaces the ones that look most like the portfolio. These are the closest matchesthat aren’t grantees — a resemblance in what they say they do, not a recommendation.
The organization's primary mission is conserving land where people and nature can thrive by creating green corridors linking existing public lands using conservation easments and outright purchase.
To restore and protect clean water and healthy ecosystems for rivers in tennessee by employing scientific expertise and collaborative relationships to develop, promote, and support broad community stewardship and action.
Eastern national promotes the public's understanding and support of america's national parks and other public trust partners by providing quality educational experiences, products and services.
The natural areas conservancy champions urban natural areas in new york city and across the nation through innovative research, partnerships, and advocacy. we increase the health and resilience of urban forests and wetlands, catalyze…
Nashville banner is a locally owned, community supported, civic news organization. we exist to empower the people of nashville to make informed decisions by providing non-partisan journalism from an independent, nonprofit newsroom. we are…
Our mission is to serve our members through education, professionalism, and legislative involvement
Ntc mission is to advance the diverse technology ecosystem by connecting and promoting members, attracting, growing and retaining tech talent, and providing opportunities to reinvest in the greater nashville community.
To educate and advocate for the conservation and improvement of tennessees environment, communities and public health
Arts & business council of greater nashville supports and promotes the arts by driving collaboration between arts and business that contribute to the creativity, vitality, and prosperity of greater nashville/the regions/the city.
Nacwa is the national voice of public clean water utilities, shaping water policy, convening a vibrant peer network, and empowering water leaders.
The organization's mission is to conserve and promote new england's native plants to ensure healthy, biologically diverse landscapes.
To sustain the vibrancy of nashville's centennial park, home to the historic parthenon, by supporting metro parks in revitalizing & activating this public green space to ensure the park remains a welcoming destination for recreation,…
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Nashville Parks Foundation and the most unlike its peers is Time to Rise Inc. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
Your grantees are a median of 39 years old; the field is 17. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 19% startups (under 5 years old) — 0% of your grantees by number, and just 0% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 2% lost their exemption, against 11% of the field you don’t fund.
Age = years since IRS exemption (a founding proxy). “Closed” = auto-revocation for 3 years of non-filing — a floor on closure, not proof, and bigger established orgs lapse least. Association, not causation.
45 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2025.
Each one resolved to its own IRS returns and tracked year by year — your grant beside their revenue from every source. Association, dated; never a causal claim.
Counted here: distinct organizations you funded across 2017–2025, not grant rows in a single year — so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 45 of the 60 grantees resolved in that span have returns of their own we could reconcile; the rest are funded organizations whose filings we could not track year by year.
Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee
Each org by its size and your share of it — top-left is where you’re load-bearing
Go grantee by grantee — a decade per org, and how each moved after you funded them
A decade per grantee — revenue shaded, your grants as bars, all rows on one timeline.
- Who funds URBAN GREEN LAB ↗
- Who funds Environmental Law Institute ↗
- Who funds NATURAL RESOURCES DEFENSE COUNCIL INC ↗
- Who funds CHEEKWOOD BOTANICAL GARDEN AND MUSEUM OF ART ↗
- Who funds SOUTHERN ENVIRONMENTAL LAW CENTER ↗
- Who funds REFED INC ↗
- Who funds SWEET BRIAR INSTITUTE ↗
- Who funds NASHVILLE FOOD PROJECT INC ↗
- Who funds NASHVILLE PARKS FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds ONE GENERATION AWAY ↗
- Who funds CUMBERLAND RIVER COMPACT INC ↗
- Who funds TURNIP GREEN CREATIVE REUSE ↗
- Who funds THE LAND TRUST FOR TENNESSEE INC ↗
- Who funds THE PHILANTHROPY WORKSHOP INC DBA FORWARD GLOBAL ↗
- Who funds NATIONAL PARKS CONSERVATION ASSOCIATION ↗
- Who funds NASHVILLE TREE FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds OLDHAM COUNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY INC ↗
- Who funds THE LEADERSHIP CONFERENCE EDUCATION FUND INC ↗
- Who funds Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law ↗
- Who funds SHAKERTOWN REVISITED INC ↗
- Who funds PROTECT DEMOCRACY PROJECT ↗
- Who funds Nashville Symphony Association ↗
- Who funds FRIENDS OF THE WARNER PARKS INC ↗
- Who funds NASHVILLE TREE CONSERVATION CORPS ↗
- Who funds UNITED WAY OF MIDDLE TENNESSEE INC ↗
- Who funds THE COMMUNITY FOUNDATION OF MIDDLE TENNESSEE INC ↗
- Who funds CIVIC DESIGN CENTER ↗
- Who funds TENNESSEANS FOR ALTERNATIVES TO THE DEATH PENALTY ↗
- Who funds NASHVILLE PUBLIC LIBRARY FOUNDATION ↗
The grantmakers whose grantees overlap with yours far more than size alone predicts. Each orbits closer the stronger the alignment; the arcs between them show where they also fund each other. Here it reads as a tightly interlocked camp — most of these funders back each other's grantees too.
Open a dossier: Msb Cockayne Fund Inc · The Community Foundation of Middle Tennessee Inc · The Frist Foundation · Hca Healthcare Foundation · Memorial Foundation Inc · The Wade-Buntin Family Foundation · Dorothy Cate and Thomas F Frist Foundation · W L Lyons Brown Foundation · The Blum Family Foundation · Vanderbilt University · Sandra Schatten Foundation · James R Meadows Jr Foundation
Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. A research starting point: overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.
Government reliance of your grantees
Every dot is one organization Atticus Trust funds. Left–right is the share of its income from government; up–down is the share from you. Bigger dots raise more. Filter to federal or a single department — and drag the year to watch it move.
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 your grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first — a floor, not 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 12–24 months.
Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus
How do I get to Atticus Trust?
Find your warmest path to Atticus Trust through trustees and officers whose names appear on both boards. Search for your organization and Plinth traces the shortest route it can evidence.
Each link is a name appearing on two organizations’ public IRS 990 filings, matched on that name and, where the filings support it, on location. A same-state match has geographic support, which is a second matching feature rather than confirmation that the two are one person; a cross-state one is the likeliest to be two people who share a name. Every hop shows its tier, low-confidence and distant paths are held back rather than guessed, and it is worth confirming the person before you use the introduction.