· Private foundation
Clifton Foundation Inc
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 FY2020–2024.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2024
- Under $10k42 grants · $84k
- $10k–50k7 grants · $140k
- $50k–250k1 grant · $126k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| KENTUCKY COLLEGE OF ART & DESIGN AT SPALDING UNIVERSITY ATTN MEGHAN GREENW | $126,000 |
| WHITNEY MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART | $36,285 |
| LOUISVILLE ORCHESTRA | $30,000 |
| THE NATURE CONSERVANCY OF KENTUCKY | $22,500 |
| PLANNED PARENTHOOD | $20,000 |
| LOUISVILLE BALLET | $11,000 |
| BLUEGRASS LAND CONSERVANCY | $10,000 |
| FAULKNER MORGAN ARCHIVE INC | $10,000 |
| CREATIVE CAPITAL | $9,000 |
| WATERFRONT BOTANICAL GARDENS | $9,000 |
| RIVER FIELDS INC | $5,500 |
| ACLU KY FOUNDATION REPRODUCTIVE FREEDOM PROJECT | $5,000 |
| ST FRANCIS SCHOOL | $5,000 |
| OLD ISLAND RESTORATION FOUNDATION | $5,000 |
| KENTUCKY RESOURCES COUNCIL INC | $5,000 |
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 (FY20–24, $50k) land where the poverty rate runs at 17%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 98% 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.
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 +43% since the first grant, against +17% for the ones you funded once.
57 repeat relationships — 43 still active in FY2024, 14 since wound down; 6 grantees were first funded in FY2024 (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 FY2024, 96% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $14k 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
- TLTHE LOUISVILLE ORCHESTRA INC2× · 2022–2024 · $130k · revenue +42%
- WMWHITNEY MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART5× · 2020–2024 · $83k · revenue +69%
- SASPEED ART MUSEUM4× · 2020–2023 · $55k · revenue +128%
Funded once
- SCSOUTHERN CALIFORNIA EQUESTRIAN SPORTSgraduatedone grant, 2021 · $75k · revenue +135%
- PPPLANNED PARENTHOOD FEDERATION OF AMERICA ATTN ONLINE SERVICESone grant, 2020 · $30k
- HSHINDMAN SETTLEMENT SCHOOL INCgraduatedone grant, 2022 · $25k · revenue +79%
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.
To improve the quality of life for all kentuckians through research, education and advocacy on important policy issues facing the commonwealth.
The louisville preservation fund,inc. revitalizes historic places through direct real estate action and partnerships to enhance community and promote economic development.
To conserve the unique character of tennessee's natural and historic landscapes and sites for future generations.
To empower and educate people to value, preserve and save greater cincinnati's historic buildings, communities, landscapes and stories.
The kentucky college of art and design opens the door to a creative and productive life through an undergraduate education in the contemporary arts.
The mission is to provide education to the local population on the wonders of our environment.
Our mission is to improve the health and quality of life for louisville's current and future generations through a robust, equitable and diverse tree canopy.
Kentucky harvest's purpose is to end local hunger by connecting with food donors and engaging volunteers to rescue excess food and move it from those who have it to those in need.
To support grassroots organizing, leadership development & public education around important public policy. ky coalition seeks to promote active citizen participation in the democratic process.
Kmac is louisvilles premier contemporary art museum in downtown louisville on museum row. through exhibitions, education, and outreach, kmac works to connect people to art and creative practice.
To represent our members, creating the environment and opportunity for economic prosperity and quality living in central kentucky.
Legacy greenscapes, inc. mission is to provide continuing leadership and financial support to preserve legacy of and promote greenscapes located in the city of winchester, clark county, ky.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Leadership Kentucky Foundation Inc and the most unlike its peers is Masters School. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
For each theme you fund, this compares how the sector’s money is shifting with how your own giving is shifting.
Sector change and giving change are each shown relative to their own range, growing (right) or shrinking (left); both normalized, so inflation isn’t mistaken for growth.
Your grantees are a median of 45 years old; the field is 18. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 20% startups (under 5 years old) — 2% of your grantees by number, and just 0% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 0.0% lost their exemption, against 12% 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.
56 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. 56 of the 91 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 THE LOUISVILLE ORCHESTRA INC ↗
- Who funds THE NATURE CONSERVANCY ↗
- Who funds WHITNEY MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART ↗
- Who funds SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA EQUESTRIAN SPORTS ↗
- Who funds SPEED ART MUSEUM ↗
- Who funds FUND FOR THE ARTS INC ↗
- Who funds CREATIVE CAPITAL FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds KENTUCKY DANCE COUNCIL INC DBA LOUISVILLE BALLET ↗
- Who funds FRANCIS PARKER SCHOOL OF LOUISVILLE INC ST FRANCIS HIGH SCHOOL INC ↗
- Who funds MUHAMMAD ALI MUSEUM AND EDUCATION CENTER ↗
- Who funds HINDMAN SETTLEMENT SCHOOL INC ↗
- Who funds BLUEGRASS LAND CONSERVANCY INC ↗
- Who funds KENTUCKY 4H FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds WATERFRONT BOTANICAL GARDENS INC ↗
- Who funds KENTUCKY RESOURCES COUNCIL INC ↗
- Who funds THE HEALING PLACE INC ↗
- Who funds RIVER FIELDS INC ↗
- Who funds FAULKNER MORGAN ARCHIVE ↗
- Who funds HOSPARUS INC HOSPARUS HEALTH ↗
- Who funds LOUISVILLE STORY PROGRAM ↗
- Who funds ISAAC W BERNHEIM FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds THE FILSON HISTORICAL SOCIETY INC ↗
- Who funds AMERICAN FARMLAND TRUST ↗
- Who funds OLD ISLAND RESTORATION FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds KENTUCKY PUBLIC RADIO INC ↗
- Who funds OLDHAM COUNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY INC ↗
- Who funds LOUISVILLE CENTRAL COMMUNITY CENTERINC ↗
- Who funds THE MORTON CENTER INC ↗
- Who funds THE CENTER FOR WOMEN AND FAMILIES INC ↗
- Who funds FOODCHAIN INC ↗
- Who funds THE BERRY CENTER INC ↗
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: The Community Foundation of Louisville Inc · Snowy Owl Foundation Inc · W L Lyons Brown Foundation · Owsley Brown II Family Foundation Inc · The Community Foundation of Louisville Depository Inc · Sociable Weaver Foundation Inc · The Gheens Foundation Inc · LG&E and Ku Foundation Inc · Ina B Bond Ashbourne Charitable Fund Inc · Brown-Forman Foundation · Republic Bank Foundation Inc · The Norton Foundation Inc
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 Clifton Foundation Inc 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 Clifton Foundation Inc?
Find your warmest path to Clifton Foundation Inc 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.