· Private foundation
Burnam Charitable Foundation
Its FY2026 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 FY2017–2026.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2026
- $10k–50k1 grant · $10k
- $50k–250k1 grant · $225k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| VASSAR COLLEGE | $225,000 |
| CATALYST CALIFORNIA | $10,000 |
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.
Dollar for dollar, your grants (FY17–26) land where the poverty rate runs at 10%, against an area that typically sits at 10%. 21% of your dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Your grants skew toward lower-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.
Which US states your grants reach
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.
And the relationships you keep tend to grow: grantees you re-up on have seen median revenue of +32% since the first grant, against +22% for the ones you funded once.
35 repeat relationships — 2 still active in FY2026, 33 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 FY2026, 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
- VCVASSAR COLLEGE9× · 2017–2026 · $788k · revenue +19%
- TITREEPEOPLE INC3× · 2022–2024 · $85k · revenue +38%
- NWNATIONAL WILDLIFE FEDERATION4× · 2018–2024 · $13k · revenue +87%
Funded once
- CTCENTER THEATER GROUPone grant, 2022 · $3k
- TTThe Thacher School Incone grant, 2022 · $1k · revenue +22%
- SUSPEAK UP FOUNDATIONone grant, 2022 · $500 · revenue +261%
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.
Create and publish educational materials, conduct professional development, promote awareness, and sponsor research on the spectacular biological diversity of the State of CA.
To ensure coast redwood forests in the santa cruz mountains thrive for generations to come. since 1900, sempervirens has protected more than 36,000 acres. learn more about our mission, vision, and strategic plan through 2030 at:…
Sustainable Conservation advances the collaborative stewardship of Californias land, air, and water for the benefit of nature and people. For over three decades, Sustainable Conservation has built coalitions of people with different…
The trust for public land creates parks and protects land for people, ensuring healthy, livable communities for generations to come. in the past year, we helped communities to plan for parks and conservation, fund parks and conservation,…
Nature collective's mission is to drive a passion for nature for all. we think inclusively and diversely when serving those devoid of nature those who remember nature and want to connect back to it and those who have an affinity with…
The Chile-California Council is a San Francisco-based nonprofit dedicated to developing and promoting joint endeavors and cooperative relations between Chile and California, as well as individuals, legal entities and other institutions in…
The union of concerned scientists puts rigorous, independent science into action, developing solutions and advocating for a healthy, safe, and just future.
The resource renewal institute facilitates the creation, development and implementation of practical strategies to solve the entire complex environmental problem by addressing it comprehensively.
The California Wilderness Coalition protects the natural landscapes that make California unique, providing clean air and water, a home to wildlife, and a place for recreation and spiritual renewal.
Council for watershed health advances the health and sustainability of the region's watersheds, rivers, streams, and habitats - in both natural areas and urban neighborhoods - through science-based research, education, and inclusive…
The foundation works with diverse groups representing many interests to acquire and restore critical wildlife habitat and protecting species
As california state parks' statutory non-profit partner, we have a clear mission - to help strengthen parks and inspire all people to experience these extraordinary places.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is California State Parks Foundation and the most unlike its peers is National Wildlife Federation. 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 55 years old; the field is 13. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 25% startups (under 5 years old) — 4% of your grantees by number, and just 0% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 4% lost their exemption, against 15% 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.
25 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2026.
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 2017–2026, not grant rows in a single year — so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 25 of the 42 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 VASSAR COLLEGE ↗
- Who funds TREEPEOPLE INC ↗
- Who funds CATALYST CALIFORNIA ↗
- Who funds NEW ISRAEL FUND ↗
- Who funds NATIONAL WILDLIFE FEDERATION ↗
- Who funds LIBERTY HILL FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds CONCERN FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds OAKWOOD SCHOOL ↗
- Who funds ADVOT ↗
- Who funds SIERRA CLUB FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds AMERICAN JEWISH COMMITTEE ↗
- Who funds UNITED WAY INC ↗
- Who funds SOUTHERN POVERTY LAW CENTER INC ↗
- Who funds Beit T'Shuvah ↗
- Who funds NATUREBRIDGE ↗
- Who funds VENICE FAMILY CLINIC ↗
- Who funds Western Center on Law & Poverty Inc ↗
- Who funds The Thacher School Inc ↗
- Who funds Santa Monica Mountains Fund ↗
- Who funds THE MONO LAKE FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds California Native Plant Society ↗
- Who funds CALIFORNIA STATE PARKS FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds THEODORE PAYNE FOUNDATION FOR WILD FLOWERS AND NATIVE PLANTS INC ↗
- Who funds SPEAK UP 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: California Community Foundation · The Annenberg Foundation · Jewish Community Foundation of Los Angeles · Gs Donor Advised Philanthropy Fund for Wealth Management Inc · Raymond James Charitable Endowment Fund · Vanguard Charitable Endowment Program · American Endowment Foundation · Morgan Stanley Global Impact Funding Trust Inc · American Online Giving Foundation Inc · The Bank of America Charitable Foundation Inc · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund
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 Burnam Charitable Foundation 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 Burnam Charitable Foundation?
Find your warmest path to Burnam 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.