How much does Bertha Stebens Charitable Foundation give?

Bertha Stebens Charitable Foundation reported 39 grants totaling $142,800 in its FY2025 IRS filing. It funded between 28 and 43 organizations a year over FY2018 to FY2024.

What does Bertha Stebens Charitable Foundation fund?

By grant dollars over FY2017 to FY2025, its largest causes are Education (19%), Arts & Culture (16%), Human Services (15%).

Who are Bertha Stebens Charitable Foundation's largest grantees?

By total granted over FY2017 to FY2025: North Iowa Area Community College Foundation ($85k), Clear Lake Classical Incorporated ($61k), Elderbridge Agency on Aging ($47k).

Does Bertha Stebens Charitable Foundation fund new organizations?

In FY2024, 16% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.

Does Bertha Stebens Charitable Foundation accept unsolicited applications?

Its most recent filing reports that it accepts unsolicited grant applications.

Which funders back the same organizations as Bertha Stebens Charitable Foundation?

Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include Farrer Endowment Foundation, First Citizens Bank Charitable Foundation, The David & Phyllis Murphy Charitable Foundation.

Where is Bertha Stebens Charitable Foundation based?

Bertha Stebens Charitable Foundation is based in DE.

Bertha Stebens Charitable Foundation

Bertha Stebens Charitable Foundation at a glance

· Private foundation

Bertha Stebens Charitable Foundation

Its FY2025 filing reports that it accepted unsolicited grant applications.

$143k

Granted FY2025still arriving

Grants FY2025still arriving

States reached

$8k

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, FY2017 to 2025.

Education$245kArts & Culture$214kHuman Services$199kHealth$159kFood & Nutrition$91kCommunity Improvement$85kYouth Development$82kHousing & Shelter$56kOther$0

02FY2025 · 39 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

$3,000

Median grant

States reached

$3.3M

Total assets

Largest grants
Recipient	Amount
NORTH IOWA COMMUNITY ACTION ORGANIZATION	$7,500
FREEDOM INN HIS GRACE MINISTRY	$7,000
COMMUNITY KITCHEN OF NORTH IOWA	$6,000
MERCY MEDICAL CENTER FOUNDATION NORTH IOWA	$5,600
CLEAR LAKE DEVELOPMENT FOUNDATION	$5,000
STEBENS CHILDRENS THEATRE	$5,000
NORTH IOWA BAND FESTIVAL FOUNDATION	$5,000
CARING PREGNANCY CENTER	$5,000
NORTH IOWA AREA COMMUNITY COLLEGE FOUNDATION	$5,000
MEALS ON WHEELS OF MASON CITY INC	$5,000
ELDERBRIDGE AGENCY ON AGING	$5,000
STEBENS CHILDRENS THEATRE	$5,000
HABITAT FOR HUMANITY INTERNATIONAL INC	$4,000
CLEAR LAKE CLASSICAL INCORPORATED	$4,000
NORTH IOWA VOCATIONAL CENTER INC	$4,000

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:

Its human-services grants (FY17–25, $103k) land where the poverty rate runs at 12%, against an area that typically sits at 12%. 0% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Its grants skew toward lower-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.

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.

90%of every dollar goes to organizations it has funded before.

$1.2M · 64 repeat orgs$125k to everyone else

Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +24% since the first grant, against +11% for those funded once.

64 repeat relationships: 33 still active in FY2025, 31 since wound down; 4 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

Total granted

$1.2M

$108k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+24%

+11%

Still filing today

59%

26%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2025, 88% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $17k went to new ones.

RenewedFirst-time

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

Human ServicesArts & CultureHealthHousing & ShelterEducationFood & NutritionOther

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

NI
NORTH IOWA AREA COMMUNITY COLLEGE FOUNDATION
7× · 2019–2025 · $85k · revenue +148%
CL
CLEAR LAKE CLASSICAL INCORPORATED
9× · 2017–2025 · $61k · revenue +651%
YM
YOUNG MEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION
6× · 2018–2025 · $43k · revenue +23%

Funded once

MM
MERCY MEDICAL CENTERgraduated
one grant, 2017 · $20k · revenue +59%
CL
CLEAR LAKE ARTS CENTER
one grant, 2018 · $20k
SV
SWALEDALE VOLUNTEER FIRE DEPARTMENT
one grant, 2018 · $5k

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.

Visit Mason City Inc

Enhance the economy of mason city and promote the north iowa area as a destination for overnight visitors.

Community Improvement

Iowa Chapter of Children's Advocacy Centers

To promote the development, growth and utilization of childrens advocacy centers and multidisciplinary teams to better serve Iowas abused and neglected children and their families.

Crime & Legal

Iowa Great Lakes Chamber of Commerce

To advance tourism, assist in new and existing business development and promote economic, professional, cultural and civic interests in the iowa great lakes area.

—

North Iowa Corridor Economic Development Corporation

Support business and industry with retention and expansion projects and attract new business and industry to cerro gordo county, mason city and clear lake.

Community Improvement

Iowa Newspaper Association

To improve member newspapers

—

West Central Community Action

In partnership with state and federal government, our mission is to administer programs designed to help residents in our 10-county region of southwest iowa achieve self-sufficiency.

Human Services

Iowa Center for Children's Justice

ICCJ assists children in custody disputes through child focused education and legal services. ICCJ provides education and legal services on a reduced fee or at no charge based on the ability to pay.

Civil Rights

Central Iowa Shelter & Services

The organization endeavors to provide safe emergency and transitional shelter and meals to homeless adults along with resource assistance to move clients beyond homelessness and toward independent living.

Housing & Shelter

Heart of Iowa Habitat for Humanity

To provide low-cost housing to eligible families.

—

Iowa Association of Community Action Directors

To assist in the provision of a better life for iowa's low-income residents, through assistance to the community action organization located within the state.

—

Central Iowa Juvenile Detention Center

To provide a highly structured environment which emphasizes a safety and security to all juveniles while serving as a deterrent to criminal and anti-social behaviors. Working youth in the center and communities.

—

Community Action of Eastern Iowa

Community action of eastern iowa respectfully partners with people to improve their health, finances, and education.

Community Improvement

How this is measured

The grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is North Iowa Transition and Employment Services Inc; the most unlike its peers is Christmas Cheer Fund Inc. 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

48 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2026.

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 2026, not grant rows in a single year, so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 48 of the 91 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)

Early backer (in before they grew)

48/48

Grantees still filing

32/48

Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

Other$786,709Education$145,500Human Services$113,200Health$105,368Housing & Shelter$76,500Food & Nutrition$44,445Arts & Culture$42,500

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.

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.

Farrer Endowment FoundationIA89.4× affinity40 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Farrer Endowment Foundation · First Citizens Bank Charitable Foundation · The David & Phyllis Murphy Charitable Foundation · Tomson Family Foundation Trust · John K and Luise V Hanson Foundation · United Way of North Central Iowa · Alliant Energy Foundation Inc · Beth E Reinhart Charitable Trust · Kinney-Lindstrom Foundation Inc · Community Fdn of Greater Des Moines F/K/A Greater Des Moines Community Fdn · Dorothy Ann Weitzel and Thomas F W · Stratford 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 Bertha Stebens Charitable Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from Bertha Stebens Charitable Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.

2024

’20’21’22’23’24’25

no gov moneyreceives it· size = income

0get no government money at all

19report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)

0rely 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 Bertha Stebens Charitable Foundation?

Find your warmest path to Bertha Stebens Charitable 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 Bertha Stebens’ 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