· Private foundation
Helen John Foundation
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 FY2017–2024.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2024
- Under $10k8 grants · $18k
- $10k–50k1 grant · $10k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| ALS ASSOCIATION OF OR AND SW WASHINGTON | $10,000 |
| GONZAGA UNIVERSITY | $2,800 |
| HOLY FAMILY CATHOLIC SCHOOL | $2,800 |
| ST ANDREW NATIVITY SCHOOL | $2,800 |
| Individual grant recipient | $2,800 |
| ST PIUS CATHOLIC CHURCH | $2,800 |
| OREGON HUMANE SOCIETY | $2,000 |
| PORTLAND DACHSHUND RESCUE | $1,000 |
| HOLY FAMILY CATHOLIC SCHOOL | $1,000 |
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 (FY17–24) land where the poverty rate runs at 11%, against an area that typically sits at 9%. 81% of your 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.
Where the work is directed
The same grants, placed two ways — where each recipient sits, and where its stated purpose earmarks the money.
About 23% of Helen John Foundation’s grant dollars are earmarked, by their stated purpose, for a different county than the recipient’s own address — money that lands at a nonprofit in one place but is meant to do its work in another.
Recipient view: each grant at its grantee’s ZIP, mapped to a county. Directed view: each grant at the county its stated purpose names, falling back to the recipient’s county when the purpose names no place; US grants only. A county shows only if it carries the top 95% of that view’s dollars. Purposes are read from the foundation’s own 990 grant descriptions.
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.
17 repeat relationships — 7 still active in FY2024, 10 since wound down; 1 grantees were first funded in FY2024 (too recent to call).
How the two cohorts compare
Organizations
Total granted
Still filing today
New vs renewed · share of each year
In FY2024, 96% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $1k 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
- ANALS Northwest2× · 2017–2018 · $30k · revenue +61%
CORPORATION OF GONZAGA UNIVERSITY8× · 2017–2024 · $17k · revenue +42%
OREGON HUMANE SOCIETY7× · 2017–2024 · $13k · revenue +26%
Funded once
- BSBOISE STATE UNIVERSITY FBO BRIDIG LEAKEone grant, 2017 · $9k
- ICIDAHO CENTER FOR FISCAL POLICYone grant, 2019 · $600
- CFCENTER FOR HUMAN RIGHTSone grant, 2019 · $600
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.
Idaho Animal Rescue Network is a 501(c)(3) non-profit based in Idaho that works in Idaho and Eastern Washington to educate, advocate, and network with other rescues and law enforcement in Idaho regarding animal cruelty and neglect. We are…
Animal Humane Society (AHS) established in 1878 and incorporated as a nonprofit charitable organization in 1891 works to engage the hearts, hands, and minds of the community to help animals. AHS's vision is to compassionately and…
The vision of Spokane Humane Society is to enrich the lives of animals and their companions through Support, Education, Advocacy and Love (SEAL). As the oldest local non-profit in Spokane, we have been serving companion animals in need and…
Idaho legal aid services inc is a statewide nonprofit law firm dedicated to providing equal access for low-income people through quality advocacy and education
The Idaho Law Foundation maintains a continuing legal education program and administers grants to 1) educate the public, 2) provide legal services to the state's indigent, 3) develop programs to improve the administration of justice and…
Seattle humane promotes the human-animal bond by saving and serving pets in need, regardless of age, ability, circumstance or geography.
Founded in 1973, dove lewis emergency animal hospital, inc. (dovelewis) is one of the premier veterinary medical service organizations in the us and the only 24/7 not-for-profit animal emergency, critical care, and specialty hospital in…
Conduct rescue of dogs, facilitate adoptions of same. provide emergency vet services for dogs needing rescue
The mission of the Wisconsin Humane Society is to make a difference for animals and the people who love them.
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…
To reduce animal cruelty and suffering, with emphasis on providing low-cost spay/neuter and wellness services. Specifically, WAGs goal is to reduce pet overpopulation through our high-quality, high-volume, low-cost spay/neuter clinic in…
The Rogue Valley Humane Society provides compassionate care for stray unwanted displaced and abandoned animals and works toward ending pet overpopulation so that there will be no more homeless pets. We are committed to placing every…
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Idaho Humanities Council Inc and the most unlike its peers is Portland Dachshund Rescue Inc. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
10 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. 10 of the 25 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 ALS Northwest ↗
- Who funds CORPORATION OF GONZAGA UNIVERSITY ↗
- Who funds OREGON HUMANE SOCIETY ↗
- Who funds ST ANDREW LEGAL CLINIC ↗
- Who funds Idaho Humane Society Inc ↗
- Who funds LAKE OSWEGO SCHOOL DISTRICT FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds IDAHO HUMANITIES COUNCIL INC ↗
- Who funds IDAHO WOMENS CHARITABLE FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds MEDECINS SANS FRONTIERES USA INC ↗
- Who funds PORTLAND DACHSHUND RESCUE 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 Oregon Community Foundation · The Blackbaud Giving Fund · Network for Good · American Endowment Foundation · National Philanthropic Trust · The Bank of America Charitable Foundation Inc · American Online Giving Foundation Inc · 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 Helen John 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, a single department, or state — and drag the year to watch it move.
- St Andrew Legal Clinic — 2% of income from government
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.