How much does The Barr Foundation give?

The Barr Foundation reported 903 grants totaling $123,235,702 in its FY2024 IRS filing. It funded between 436 and 549 organizations a year over FY2020 to FY2023.

What does The Barr Foundation fund?

By grant dollars over FY2020 to FY2024, its largest causes are Education (24%), Environment (19%), Arts & Culture (14%).

Who are The Barr Foundation's largest grantees?

By total granted over FY2020 to FY2024: National Center for Civic Innovation In ($18M), United States Energy Foundation ($17M), Conservation Law Foundation Inc ($16M).

Does The Barr Foundation fund new organizations?

In FY2023, 25% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.

Does The Barr Foundation accept unsolicited applications?

Its most recent filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and does not take unsolicited requests. Check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.

Which funders back the same organizations as The Barr Foundation?

Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include The Klarman Family Foundation, The Hyams Foundation Inc, Nellie Mae Education Foundation Inc.

Where is The Barr Foundation based?

The Barr Foundation is based in Boston, MA.

The Barr Foundation

The Barr Foundation at a glance Also receives grants: funding profile →

Boston, MA · Private foundation

The Barr 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.

$123M

Granted FY2024still arriving

903

Grants FY2024still arriving

States reached

$3.3M

Largest

01What it funds

01100% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2020 to 2024.

Education$124MEnvironment$102MArts & Culture$74MCommunity Improvement$70MPhilanthropy$63MPublic Benefit$36MCivil Rights$11MHousing & Shelter$10MOther$0

02beneath the categories

What the grant descriptions say

Themes read from the grant descriptions, beneath the NTEE codes.

Each cell is that theme’s share of the year’s giving · ⚡ ringed cells mark a flagged jump.

03FY2024 · 903 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

Grant-size mix · FY2020–FY2024

FY20

41%

56%

$87.7M

FY21

34%

64%

$100.3M

FY22

33%

66%

$108.5M

FY23

36%

62%

$106.9M

FY24

38%

59%

$123.2M

Under $10k$10k–50k$50k–250k$250k+

In FY2020, 56% of its dollars went out in $250k+ checks; by FY2024, 59%. Each bar is that year’s mix, not its total.

$80,000

Median grant

States reached

$2.8B

Total assets

Largest grants
Recipient	Amount
UNITED STATES ENERGY FOUNDATION	$3,275,000
COMMUNITY FOUNDATION OF WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS	$2,900,000
NATIONAL CENTER FOR CIVIC INNOVATION INC	$1,550,000
BOSTON UJIMA PROJECT INC	$1,200,000
NATIONAL CENTER FOR CIVIC INNOVATION INC	$1,180,000
CONSERVATION LAW FOUNDATION INC	$1,100,000
SRI INTERNATIONAL	$1,100,000
CONSERVATION LAW FOUNDATION INC	$1,000,000
DOUBLE EDGE THEATRE PRODUCTIONS INC	$1,000,000
MASSACHUSETTS DEVELOPMENT FINANCE AGENCY	$1,000,000
WORLD MUSIC INC	$1,000,000
MASSACHUSETTS DEVELOPMENT FINANCE AGENCY	$805,000
CREATIVE HUB WORCESTER	$750,000
MASSACHUSETTS BUDGET AND POLICY CENTER INC	$750,000
NEW ENGLAND FOUNDATION FOR THE ARTS INC	$750,000

02The need

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:

Dollar for dollar, its grants (FY20–24) land where the poverty rate runs at 16%, against an area that typically sits at 6%. 88% of its dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of its grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

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.

Which US states its grants reach

The hardship those neighborhoods carry, beyond income:

Adults without health insurance:reaches 32% in some neighborhoods (typically 4.2%)(CDC, modeled)
Food access:92 of 1366 neighborhoods are USDA-designated food deserts(USDA, 2019)

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.

Where the work is directed

The same grants placed two ways: where each recipient sits, and where its stated purpose sends the money.

About 6% of The Barr Foundation’s grant dollars are earmarked for a different county than the recipient’s own address. By recipient address, 75% of the giving stays in MA; by stated purpose, 81%.

The Barr Foundationlessmore of its giving

Placed by recipient address · 4.9% directed abroad (not shown)

How this is measured

Recipient view: each grant at its grantee’s ZIP, mapped to a county. Directed view: each grant at the county its stated purpose names, falling back to the recipient’s county when the purpose names no place; US grants only. A county shows only if it carries the top 95% of that view’s dollars. Purposes are read from the funder’s own 990 grant descriptions.

03Its grantees

repeat funding

Who it funds again

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

94%of every dollar goes to organizations it has funded before.

$444M · 587 repeat orgs$26M to everyone else

Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +30% since the first grant, against +24% for those funded once.

587 repeat relationships: 419 still active in FY2024, 168 since wound down; 133 grantees were first funded in FY2024 (too recent to call).

Of its 86 multi-year relationships, 37 repeat the same amount every year (33% of multi-year dollars), the pattern of a standing commitment.

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

587

287

Total granted

$444M

$15M

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+30%

+24%

Still filing today

84%

76%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2024, 90% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $11M went to new ones.

RenewedFirst-time

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

Arts & CultureEducationHuman ServicesEnvironmentCommunity ImprovementPhilanthropyOther

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

NATIONAL CENTER FOR CIVIC INNOVATION IN
5× · 2020–2024 · $18M · revenue +204% · 28% of their budget
UNITED STATES ENERGY FOUNDATION
5× · 2020–2024 · $17M · revenue +40%
CONSERVATION LAW FOUNDATION INC
5× · 2020–2024 · $16M · revenue +75%

Funded once

NT
NEW TEACHER PROJECT INC DBA TNTP
one grant, 2021 · $1.0M
MASSACHUSETTS LEAGUE OF COMMUNITY HEALTH CENTERS INC
one grant, 2021 · $1.0M · revenue -12%
AM
Arts Midwest Incorporated
one grant, 2021 · $815k · revenue -54%

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.

Grant terms aren’t stated in the filing; a standing commitment is inferred from a level payment pattern.

What its grantees report

Each stalk is one grantee, graded by how far its own reporting goes: an activity counted, a stated aim, or a change shown.

Of 51 organizations, 5 show a change. The rest report activities or aims.

Click an area to read it, and step through its organizations.

How this is measured

Read from 51 of the 297 organizations it funds across these 5 areas (the most heavily funded), in their own program-service reporting. Achievements are the organizations’ own.

case studies

Two relationships, up close

One grantee funded repeatedly and one funded once, each traced through its own filings.

DOUBLE EDGE THEATRE PRODUCTIONS INC

Conviction

Deep partnership; growth earned, vigilance warranted

Barr supported Double Edge Theatre across five grants from 2020 to 2024, contributing a total of $1,357,450 and at peak representing 61% of the company's budget, a depth of commitment that accompanied a 156% rise in revenue and a 4.7x increase in net assets over the grant relationship. This period overlapped with the ensemble's international touring of its Leonora, La Maga Y La Maestra cycle, expanded student training and residency programs, and a Summer Spectacle production rooted in its rural Ashfield farm campus.

5× · 2020–2024

Funded

$1.4M

Granted in total

61%

Peak share of budget

+156%

Their revenue since

CIVIC ACTION PROJECT INC

Funded once · graduated

One early bet, outsized civic momentum

Barr made a single $50,000 investment in Civic Action Project in 2021, at the time representing 77% of the organization's budget, and in the years since, CAP's revenue has grown at a 131% CAGR while net assets have expanded 5.1x, a trajectory that tracks alongside the launch of its CAP Collaborative, CAP Fellows, and New Voices programs convening public and private leaders around equity and civic policy in Massachusetts. It is a classic early-bet story: a lean, high-potential organization that absorbed a catalytic grant and built durable programming around it.

At first grant · 2021

$65k

their revenue

$50k= 77% of it

once

Latest filing · 2024

$802k×12

grown on its own, no further grants

an unusually large multiple — check the filings before citing it

2024 · what they did next

CAP Collaborative brought together 20 public and private sector leaders for 8 consecutive weeks twice a year to foster cross-sector collaboration on public policy.

projects.propublica.org

How this is measured

Trajectories are each organization’s own subsequent IRS filings; milestones are from the public record, linked to source. Revenue is the organization’s whole income from every source. We date what happened after a grant and do not claim the grant caused it.

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.

Boston Architectural College

The bac is committed to provide excellence in design education grounded in practice and accessible to diverse communities.

—

Massachusetts Higher Education Assistance Corporation

The organization's primary exempt purpose is to provide access to and conduct activities in furtherance of higher education.

—

Massachusetts Business Roundtable Inc

The mission of the roundtable is to make massachusetts the most desirable place to live, work and do business by engaging private sector executives and public leaders to ensure access to a robust, diverse and talented workforce that…

—

Wheaton College

Wheaton college provides a transformative liberal arts education, combining theory and practice, for intellectually curious students within a collaborative and vibrant extended community and network that values and strives to create an…

Education

New England Lawboston

New england law/boston dedicates itself to preparing students to be successful lawyers and leaders in the public and private sectors through integrated practical, theoretical and ethical education of the highest caliber and to contributing…

Education

Massachusetts Alliance for Early College Inc

The massachusetts alliance for early college (ma4ec) is a cross-sector coalition focused on significantly increasing the number of students with access to high-quality early college in massachusetts to promote college and career success…

Education

Massachusetts Education & Career Opportunities Inc

Massachusetts education and career opportunities, inc. (massedco, inc.) is a statewide network of service sites that provides education and career advising to over 12,000 low-income, first generation individuals each year. massedco…

Education

The New England Council Inc

To foster growth of the competitive enterprise system of business in new england; to develop and maintain comprehensive views of new england conditions and problems; to secure recognition of the commonality of economic interest specific to…

—

Native Plant Trust Inc

The organization's mission is to conserve and promote new england's native plants to ensure healthy, biologically diverse landscapes.

Environment

Aclu Foundation of Massachusetts Inc

Aclu foundation of ma was established to defend freedoms guaranteed in the constitution and bill of rights through public education and litigation.

Civil Rights

Wentworth Institute of Technology Inc

Wentworth institute of technology is a nationally recognized private coeducational and residential university of higher education with a mission to empower, inspire and innovate through experiential learning with a core purpose of career…

Education

Cambridge Chamber of Commerce

The mission of the cambridge chamber of commerce is to make cambridge a better place in which to live, to work, to do business, to visit and to study.

—

How this is measured

The grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Grantmakers for Education; the most unlike its peers is Lawrence & Lillian Solomon Foundation Inc. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.

06the grantee network

879 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. 879 of the 1,048 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.

Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)

198

Early backer (in before they grew)

864/879

Grantees still filing

583/879

Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

Other$113,444,101Education$68,241,650Environment$67,988,878Philanthropy$62,432,109Community Improvement$50,827,976Arts & Culture$42,789,413Human Services$15,116,104

Showing the 200 largest grantees by grant value.

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

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.

19 internal · 8 shared anchors

How its grantees work together

The Solomon Foundation assembled a coalition with the Mystic River Watershed Association to develop and complete the Malden River Greenway Plan. It is one of 19 direct ties among 69 of its grantees, who also cluster around 8 shared regional anchors.

Inferred: ties are read by a model from news and organization websites, and each links to its source.

Grantees connected

Grantee↔grantee ties

Shared anchors (2+ grantees)

173

External links

Tap any organization to trace its collaborations; shared anchors pull toward the center

min. connectionstheme34 shown · 8 ties

grantee external partner named by both stated inferred

Tap any organization in the graph to trace its collaborations, or start with the strongest ties below.

Strongest grantee↔grantee ties

↔
explicit Joint program
↔
explicit Joint program
↔
explicit Coalition
↔
explicit Joint program

Anchors several grantees share

4 grantees
2 grantees
2 grantees
2 grantees
2 grantees
2 grantees

Joint program 107Coalition 40Affiliation 26Funding 10Referral network 6Shared facility 3Fiscal sponsorship 1

How this is measured

Ties are extracted by a model from news and organization websites, not from tax filings, so they are directional rather than exhaustive. Corroborated ties were named independently by both organizations.

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.

The Klarman Family FoundationMA128.3× affinity87 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: The Klarman Family Foundation · The Hyams Foundation Inc · Nellie Mae Education Foundation Inc · Boston Foundation Inc · Eastern Bank Foundation · Cummings Foundation Grants Inc (Fka Oneworld Boston Inc) · Liberty Mutual Foundation Inc · The Cabot Family Charitable Trust · The New Commonwealth Racial Equity and Social Justice Fund Inc · Children's Hospital Corporation · Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities & Public Policy Inc · Combined Jewish Philanthropies of Greater Boston Inc

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 The Barr Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from The Barr Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.

2024

’20’21’22’23’24’25

Northeast Energy Efficiency Partnerships: 100% of income from government
Roca Inc: 78% of income from government
Massachusetts Foundation for the Humanities & Public Policy Inc: 45% of income from government
Boston Harbor Now Inc: 45% of income from government
Generation Teach Inc: 42% of income from government
Newvue Communities Inc: 40% of income from government
Health Resources in Action Inc: 39% of income from government
Boston Chinatown Neighborhood Center Inc: 38% of income from government
The Yard Inc: 28% of income from government
Masscreative Inc: 26% of income from government
Uncornered Inc: 24% of income from government
United Way of Massachusetts Bay Inc: 23% of income from government
Enterprise Community Partners Inc: 22% of income from government
Applied Economics Clinic Inc: 22% of income from government
Worcester Cultural Coaltioninc: 21% of income from government
Mystic River Watershed Association Inc: 18% of income from government
Greater Lowell Community Foundation Inc: 18% of income from government
He Is Me Institute Inc: 16% of income from government
Massachusetts League of Community Health Centers Inc: 15% of income from government
Massachusetts Charter Public School Association Inc: 15% of income from government
The Teachers' Lounge Inc: 14% of income from government
Trustees of Boston University: 12% of income from government
New England Aquarium Corporation: 12% of income from government
Nectar Community Investments Inc: 12% of income from government
Teach Western Mass Inc: 11% of income from government
Ebcdc Inc: 11% of income from government
Southcoast Community Foundation Inc: 10% of income from government
New Haven Ecology Project Inc: 9% of income from government
Massachusetts Immigrant and Refugee Advocacy Coalition Inc: 8% of income from government
Charles River Watershed Association Inc: 8% of income from government
New England Foundation for the Arts Incorporated: 8% of income from government
President and Fellows of Harvard College: 7% of income from government
Digital Ready Inc: 6% of income from government
Arts Connect International Inc: 6% of income from government
Beyond Walls Inc: 6% of income from government
World Music Inc: 5% of income from government
Benjamin Franklin Cummings Institute of Technology: 5% of income from government
Huntington Theatre Co Inc: 4% of income from government
Zeiterion Theatre Inc: 4% of income from government
Silk Road Project Inc: 4% of income from government
The Celebrity Series of Boston Inc: 3% of income from government
Third Sector New England Inc: 3% of income from government
Peabody Essex Museum Inc: 3% of income from government
Franklin W Olin College of Engineering Inc: 2% of income from government
The Theater Offensive Inc: 2% of income from government
Berkshire Taconic Community Foundation Inc: 2% of income from government
The Trustees of Reservations: 2% of income from government
Bikes Not Bombs Inc: 2% of income from government
Inquilinos Boricuas En Accion Inc: 2% of income from government
Double Edge Theatre Productions Inc: 2% of income from government
Resist Inc: 2% of income from government
Grub Street Inc: 2% of income from government
Essex County Community Foundation Inc: 2% of income from government
Greenroots Inc: 1% of income from government
The Institute of Contemporary Art Inc: 1% of income from government
The Marion Institute Inc: 1% of income from government
Edvestors Inc: 1% of income from government
Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway Conservancy Inc: 1% of income from government
Lawyers for Civil Rights Inc: 1% of income from government
Jean Appolon Expressions Inc: 1% of income from government
Greater Worcester Community Foundation Inc: 1% of income from government
Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival Inc: 1% of income from government
Uaspire Inc: 1% of income from government
The Center for Effective Philanthropy Inc: 0% of income from government
Year Up Inc: 0% of income from government
Massachusetts Nonprofit Network: 0% of income from government
North Shore Community Development Coalit: 0% of income from government
Creative Hub Worcester: 0% of income from government
Community Labor United Inc: 0% of income from government
Emerson College: 0% of income from government
Ceres Inc: 0% of income from government
Philanthropy Massachusetts Inc: 0% of income from government
Boston Foundation Inc: 0% of income from government

no gov moneyreceives it· size = income

44get no government money at all

36report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)

2rely on government for over half their income

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.

05Through Plinth

Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

How do I get to The Barr Foundation?

Find your warmest path to The Barr Foundation 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.

Play a game based on Barr’s 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