· Private foundation
Chris Mikesell Foundation
Its FY2025 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.
What it funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2017 to 2025.
Where the money goes
Grants by size, and the largest recipients.
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| WESTERN STATE COLORADO UNIV FOUNDATION | $7,000 |
| Individual grant recipient | $6,000 |
| UNICEF USA | $5,000 |
| CRESTED BUTTE LAND TRUST | $5,000 |
| Community Foundation of Gunnison Va | $5,000 |
| Paradise Place Preschool | $4,500 |
| Crested Butte Avalanche Center Inc | $3,000 |
| Black Canyon High School | $3,000 |
| High Country Conservation Advocates | $2,000 |
| The Keewaydin Foundation | $1,000 |
| KANSAS ALLIANCE FOR WETLANDS AND STREAMS | $1,000 |
| Freedom Hooves Therapeutic Riding C | $1,000 |
Does the money reach high-need areas?
Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, against the area’s typical level.
Its human-services grants (FY17–24, $17k) land where the poverty rate runs at 11%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 53% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Its grants spread fairly evenly across need levels.
How this is measured
How this is measured
Where the work is directed
The same grants placed two ways: where each recipient sits, and where its stated purpose sends the money.
About 8% of Chris Mikesell Foundation’s grant dollars are earmarked for a different county than the recipient’s own address. By recipient address, 25% of the giving stays in KS; by stated purpose, 22%.
How this is measured
Who it funds again
Organizations funded in more than one year, against those funded once.
Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +76% since the first grant, against +23% for those funded once.
18 repeat relationships: 9 still active in FY2025, 9 since wound down; 2 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (too recent to call).
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 FY2025, 81% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $8k went to new ones.
Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant
How this is measured
Backed again, and grew
WESTERN COLORADO UNIVERSITY FOUNDATION9× · 2017–2025 · $60k · revenue +177%- CBCRESTED BUTTE LAND TRUST9× · 2017–2025 · $42k · revenue +193%
UNITED STATES FUND FOR UNICEF8× · 2017–2025 · $39k · revenue +76%
Funded once
- UCUNICEF - CHILD PROTECTION EBOLAone grant, 2023 · $6k
- UFUNICEF-Multi-Country Famine Fundone grant, 2017 · $5k
- UCUNICEF-Syrian Crisis Fundone grant, 2017 · $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.
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.
Rocky mountain wild works to protect, connect, and restore wildlife and wild lands in the southern rocky mountain region. we work to secure the biodiversity of the mountains, plains, and desert ecosystems of colorado, wyoming, utah, and…
To restore water to colorado's rivers.
The wyoming outdoor council's mission is to protect wyoming's environment and quality of life now and for future generations.
To conserve and steward the open lands and natural character of the headwaters of the colorado river in partnership with the local community.
Building leaders to protect the west's land, air, and water.
To protect and enhance agricultural land, wildlife habitat and scenic lands in western colorado to benefit the community at large, enrich lives, and provide opportunities for outdoor recreation for future generations.
Protecting the open land and special places of the roaring fork and middle colorado river valleys for wildlife, agriculture, and community forever.
The montana wildlife federation is a statewide conservation organization dedicated to protecting wildlife, wildlife habitat, and public access for outdoor recreation.
Wyoming wildlife federation delivers leadership in conservation for the state's wildlife, hunters, anglers, and conservationists through policy, education, advocacy, and habitat.
Wildearth guardians works to protect and restore the wildlife, wild places, wild rivers, and health of the american west.
Greater yellowstone coalition works with all people to protect the lands, waters, and wildlife of the greater yellowstone ecosystem, now and for future generations.
To protect and preserve lands of natural, ecological, scenic, historic, agricultural, or recreational significance in kansas.
How this is measured
17 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. 17 of the 29 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.
Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee
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.
- Who funds WESTERN COLORADO UNIVERSITY FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds CRESTED BUTTE LAND TRUST ↗
- Who funds UNITED STATES FUND FOR UNICEF ↗
- Who funds COMMUNITY FOUNDATION OF THE GUNNISON VALLEY ↗
- Who funds CRESTED BUTTE NORDIC COUNCIL ↗
- Who funds THE KEEWAYDIN FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds DZI FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds MONTROSE CHILDRENS MUSEUM ↗
- Who funds HIGH COUNTRY CONSERVATION ADVOCATES ↗
- Who funds THE YOUNG MEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION OF WICHITA KANSAS (2311) ↗
- Who funds KANSAS ALLIANCE FOR WETLANDS AND STREAMS INC ↗
- Who funds THE CLEARWATER COMMUNITY FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds FREEDOM HOOVES THERAPEUTIC RIDING CENTER INC ↗
- Who funds KANSAS FOODBANK WAREHOUSE INC ↗
- Who funds PARADOX SPORTS ↗
- Who funds American National Red Cross & Its Constituent Chapters and Branches ↗
- Who funds BLUE SKY RANCH INC ↗
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.
Open a dossier: Colorado Gives Foundation · Dea Family Foundation · Community Foundation of the Gunnison Valley · Vanguard Charitable Endowment Program · Morgan Stanley Global Impact Funding Trust Inc · Charities Aid Foundation America · National Philanthropic Trust · Network for Good · Natl Christian Charitable Fdn Inc · American Online Giving Foundation Inc · Paypal Charitable Giving Fund · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc
How this is measured
How much its grantees rely on government
Each dot is one organization Chris Mikesell Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from Chris Mikesell Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.
How this is measured
Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus
How do I get to Chris Mikesell Foundation?
Find your warmest path to Chris Mikesell 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.
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