· Private foundation
Greater Lansing Foundation
Its FY2025 filing reports that it accepted unsolicited grant applications.
Read this first · the figures below need context
74% of Greater Lansing Foundation’s FY2025 grant dollars went to Capital Region Community Foundation, not to grantees.
Its money now reaches organizations through that sponsor, which does not report who recommended each grant. FY2025 names 9 organizations directly, so a portfolio cannot be read from it.
Organizations named directly on the return
Amber years are those where most dollars went to a sponsor.
What you funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2017–2025.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2025
- Under $10k17 grants · $87k
- $10k–50k5 grants · $81k
- $250k+1 grant · $490k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| CAPITAL REGION COMMUNITY FOUNDATION | $489,769 |
| HARRY HARRIS SCHOLARSHIP FUND | $23,323 |
| CAPITAL AREA HUMANE SOCIETY | $16,221 |
| LAWRENCE AVENUE UNITED METHODIST CHURCH | $13,957 |
| EDWARD W SPARROW HOSPITAL | $13,812 |
| HAYES-GREEN-BEACH HOSPITAL | $13,672 |
| SALVATION ARMY | $8,800 |
| VOLUNTEERS OF AMERICA MI | $8,800 |
| AMERICAN HUMANE ASSOCIATION | $8,800 |
| BORN FREE USA | $8,800 |
| AMERICAN CANCER SOCIETY | $8,800 |
| HUMANE SOCIETY OF THE US | $8,800 |
| NATIONAL ANTI-VIVISECTION SOCIETY | $8,800 |
| WKAR-DEPARTMENT OF BROADCASTING | $7,217 |
| ORIGAMI REHABILITATION | $7,217 |
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 (FY21–25, $19k) land where the poverty rate runs at 16%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 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 +46% since the first grant, against +3% for the ones you funded once.
24 repeat relationships — 22 still active in FY2025, 2 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 FY2025, 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
- ICINGHAM COUNTY HUMANE SOCIETY9× · 2017–2025 · $102k · revenue +64%
- EWEDWARD W SPARROW HOSPITAL9× · 2017–2025 · $80k · revenue +40%
- NANATIONAL ANTI-VIVISECTION SOCIETY9× · 2017–2025 · $58k · revenue +88%
Funded once
- I5IMPRESSION 5 SCIENCE CENTERone grant, 2022 · $5k · revenue -33%
- CRCAPITOL REGION CHAPTER OF NATLone grant, 2020 · $5k
- PPPOTTER PARK ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETYgraduatedone grant, 2019 · $4k · revenue +36%
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 and save lives through compassionate care, community engagement and advocacy for animals.
Humane society of southwestern michigan exists to provide shelter and care for sick, homeless and unwanted animals. in addition, the organization provides adoption services for the animals in its care.
Lincoln park zoo is dedicated to connecting people with nature by providing a free, family-oriented wildlife experience in the heart of chicago and by advancing the highest quality of animal care, horticulture, education, science and…
Every farmer and rancher participating in the Certified Humane program had to modify their operations to meet the Animal Care Standards and be certified. Schedule O
The mission of the Detroit Zoological Society (DZS) is to create meaningful connections between people, animals and the natural world so all can thrive. The vision of the DZS is to be a force for positive change in a world where animals…
Animal care sanctuary's lifesaving mission as a no kill organization envisions a community that promotes turning compassion into action for companion animals by: 1.) adopting healthy pet companions into loving homes. 2.) promoting the…
Inspiring communities to save wildlife for future generations.
To maintain and operate a hospital, ambulance and veterinary services for the care of animals. the maintenance and operation of kennels and suitable chambers for the humane destruction of wounded animals.
Our mission is to foster compassionate human and animal connections; forge safe, healthy, and thriving communities for animals; provide care and transitional sheltering to animals; provide leadership and guidance to the animal sheltering…
The mission of the michigan animal rescue league is to provide the highest quality of life to dogs and cats through rescue, medical care, socialization and behavioral support, short- and long-term sanctuary, adoption, and community…
Our mission is to promote the humane treatment and responsible care of animals in west michigan through education, example, placement and protection.
To act as a vehicle to provide access to organized systems of health care and improve the health status of individuals in the community.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Capital Region Community Foundation and the most unlike its peers is Humane World for Animals Inc. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
15 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. 15 of the 34 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 CAPITAL REGION COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds INGHAM COUNTY HUMANE SOCIETY ↗
- Who funds EDWARD W SPARROW HOSPITAL ↗
- Who funds NATIONAL ANTI-VIVISECTION SOCIETY ↗
- Who funds Humane World for Animals Inc ↗
- Who funds AMERICAN HUMANE ASSOCIATION ↗
- Who funds UNIVERSITY REHABILITATION ALLIANCE INC ↗
- Who funds IMPRESSION 5 SCIENCE CENTER ↗
- Who funds POTTER PARK ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY ↗
- Who funds LIBRARY OF MICHIGAN FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds DISABILITY NETWORK CAPITAL AREA ↗
- Who funds HOSPICE OF LANSING ↗
- Who funds DKG SUPPORTING CORPORATION ↗
- Who funds DKG INTERNATIONAL EDUCATORS FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds FORSTER WOODS ADULT DAY SERVICES ↗
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: Capital Region Community Foundation · Dart Foundation fka Solid Waste Management Foundation · Delta Dental Plan of Michigan Inc · Consumers Energy Foundation · Lansing Economic Area Partnership · The Bank of America Charitable Foundation Inc · Vanguard Charitable Endowment Program · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund · Amazonsmile Foundation
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 Greater Lansing 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 Greater Lansing Foundation?
Find your warmest path to Greater Lansing 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.