· Public charity
Drive for Life
DRIVE FOR LIFE foundation is organized for the purpose of receiving contributions in order to raise funds to support charitable organizations in the southwest michigan region.
What you funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2018–2024.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
The 13 grants below total $908,500 — the rows itemised in this filing. The $973,491 headline is the total grant expense reported on the return, so the remaining $64,991 is giving the schedule does not break out: grants under the $5,000 itemisation floor, grants to individuals, and grants reported on other schedules. Every figure below describes the itemised rows only.
By grant size · FY2024
- Under $10k2 grants · $13k
- $10k–50k6 grants · $124k
- $50k–250k4 grants · $309k
- $250k+1 grant · $463k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| SPARTAN FUND | $463,000 |
| SOUTHWEST MICHIGAN FIRST - LEGACY COUNCIL | $103,500 |
| BRONCO ATHLETIC FUND | $100,000 |
| AMERICAN CANCER SOCIETY | $55,000 |
| JOURNEY21 | $50,000 |
| THE KIRK GIBSON FOUNDATION FOR PARKINSON'S | $35,000 |
| ZEIGLER KALAMAZOO MARATHON | $30,000 |
| KALAMAZOO COMMUNITY FOUNDATION | $20,000 |
| OCEAN REEF COMMUNITY FOUNDATION | $15,000 |
| CHEFF THERAPEUTIC RIDING CENTER | $14,000 |
| GREAT LAKES CENTER FOR THE ARTS | $10,000 |
| WMU ATHLETICS | $7,000 |
| BOYS & GIRLS CLUB OF ELKHART COUNTY | $6,000 |
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 (FY21–21, $22k) land where the poverty rate runs at 13%, against an area that typically sits at 12%. 100% 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.
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 +20% since the first grant, against +3% for the ones you funded once.
13 repeat relationships — 8 still active in FY2024, 5 since wound down; 3 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, 81% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $165k 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
- SMSOUTHWEST MICHIGAN FIRST CORP6× · 2018–2024 · $607k · revenue +69%
CHEFF THERAPEUTIC RIDING CENTER6× · 2018–2024 · $87k · revenue +121%- MIMRC Industries Inc3× · 2018–2021 · $50k · revenue +54%
Funded once
- ESEVANS SCHOLARS FOUNDATIONone grant, 2023 · $50k · revenue +13%
- FOFOLDS OF HONOR FOUNDATIONone grant, 2023 · $50k · revenue +3%
- WMWESTERN MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY HOMER STRYKER MD SCHOOL OF MEDICINEgraduatedone grant, 2018 · $25k · revenue +26%
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.
Business leaders for michigan is a nonprofit, nonpartisan statewide organization driven by ceos from the state's leading employers, all working toward a shared goal: making michigan a top 10 state for jobs, talent and a thriving economy.…
The nmu foundation will establish and foster relationships to generate resources that benefit the strategic goals of northern michigan university.
The mission of the lake michigan college foundation is to raise funds in support of lake michigan college and its students. the lake michigan college foundation is the main fund-raising organization of lake michigan college for the…
To advance the field of health for the public good.
The corporation is organized and shall be operated exclusively for charitable, educational and scientific purposes by conducting or supporting activites exclusively for the benefit of, to perform the functions of, or to carry out the…
1) to plan and conduct nonpartisan public education programs regarding free enterprise, productivity and basic economic issues affecting the state of michigan.2) to establish and operate a leadership institute designed to provide promising…
As one of the nation's leading integrated health systems, it is the mission of henry ford health system, a related entity of the filing organization, to improve people's lives through the excellence of the science and art of health care…
The mid michigan college foundation is a non-profit michigan corportion organized to receive and administer funds for charitable purposes in support of mid michigan college. the corporation is organized exclusively for the purpose of…
The mission of the michigan science center is to inspire curious minds of all ages to discover, explore and appreciate science, technology, engineering and math in a creative, dynamic learning environment.
Creating healthy communities - together
Business leaders for michigan is a nonprofit, nonpartisan statewide organization driven by ceos from the state's leading employers, all working toward a shared goal: making michigan a top 10 state for jobs, talent and a thriving economy.…
To receive and administer funds to support the mission of mclaren northern michigan and support programs that enhance the well-being of the community.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Southwest Michigan First Corp and the most unlike its peers is Movember Foundation. 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 14 years old; the field is 17. You back the younger end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 20% startups (under 5 years old) — 11% of your grantees by number, and just 2% 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.
25 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. 25 of the 36 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 SOUTHWEST MICHIGAN FIRST CORP ↗
- Who funds AMERICAN CANCER SOCIETY INC ↗
- Who funds Journey 21 Inc ↗
- Who funds CHEFF THERAPEUTIC RIDING CENTER ↗
- Who funds OCEAN REEF COMMUNITY FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds MRC Industries Inc ↗
- Who funds EVANS SCHOLARS FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds COMMUNITY FOUNDATION FOR OCEANA COUNTY ↗
- Who funds FOLDS OF HONOR FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds WESTERN MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds THE KIRK GIBSON CENTER FOR PARKINSON'S WELLNESS ↗
- Who funds Great Lakes Center for the Arts ↗
- Who funds KINGDOM KIDS INC ↗
- Who funds DRIVE FOR LIFE ↗
- Who funds WESTERN MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY HOMER STRYKER MD SCHOOL OF MEDICINE ↗
- Who funds BOYS & GIRLS CLUBS OF ELKHART COUNTY INC ↗
- Who funds KALAMAZOO COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds OCEAN REEF CHAPEL FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds MOVEMBER FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds Sherman Lake YMCA Outdoor Center ↗
- Who funds KALAMAZOO REGIONAL CATHOLIC SCHOOLS FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds GRANT CARDONE FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds GULL LAKE AREA ROBOTICS ↗
- Who funds ASCENSION BORGESS HOSPITAL ↗
- Who funds HARDYSTRONG FOUNDATION NFP ↗
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: Kalamazoo Community Foundation · Tyler-Little Family Foundation · Harold and Grace Upjohn Foundation · Suzanne Upjohn Delano Parish Foundation · United Way of South Central Michigan · The Pfizer Foundation Inc · WK Kellogg Foundation · Havirmill Foundation · Enna Foundation · Jim Gilmore Jr Foundation · Marvin and Rosalie Okun Foundation · Dorothy U Dalton 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 Drive for Life 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.