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Howard L Gottlieb Foundation at a glance

· Private foundation

Howard L Gottlieb 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.

$7k
Granted FY2025still arriving
2
Grants FY2025still arriving
2
States reached
$5k
Largest
01What it fundsRead
02The needRead
03Its granteesRead
04Its fieldRead
05Through PlinthRead
01What it funds
0194% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2020 to 2025.

Arts & Culture$546kRecreation & Sports$40kReligion$15kInternational$10kEducation$2kCrime & Legal$500Other$0
02FY2025 · 2 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

$5,009
Median grant
2
States reached
$0
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
MERIT SCHOOL OF MUSIC$5,009
SOUTHERN METHODIST UNIVERSITY$2,000
02The need
03

Does the money reach high-need areas?

Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, against the area’s typical level.

show:

Dollar for dollar, its grants (FY20–25) land where the poverty rate runs at 14%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 99% of its dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of its grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

area typical 11%ARTSMART: $10k → 22%NEW ISRAEL FUND: $5k → 17%SOUTHERN METHODIST UNIVERSITY: $2k → 14%WASHINGTON INSTITUTE FOR NEAR EAST POLICY: $5k → 14%PALM BEACH OPERA: $5k → 11%MIDWEST YOUNG ARTISTS CONSERVATORY: $500 → 8%CHICAGO PHILHARMONIC: $3k → 14%MOUNT VERNON VIRTUOSI: $3k → 11%THE PERLMAN MUSIC PROGRAM: $50k → 17%ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO: $34k → 14%BRENNAN CENTER OF JUSTICE: $500 → 17%CEDILLE RECORDS: $12k → 14%PERLMAN MUSIC PROGRAM: $25k → 17%CHICAGO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA: $25k → 14%PERLMAN MUSIC PROGRAM: $25k → 17%CHICAGO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA: $25k → 14%MERIT SCHOOL OF MUSIC: $25k → 14%MERIT SCHOOL OF MUSIC: $25k → 14%MERIT SCHOOL OF MUSIC: $5k → 14%CONGREGATION SUKKAT SHALOM: $15k → 14%THE CHICAGO SCHOOL OF VIOLIN MAKING: $5k → 14%LYRIC OPERA OF CHICAGO: $200k → 14%CHICAGO SCHOOL OF VIOLIN MAKING: $5k → 14%MITCHELL MUSEUM OF THE AMERICAN INDIAN: $36k → 14%CHICAGO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA: $25k → 14%MILENNIUM PARK FOUNDATION: $10k → 14%MILLENIUM PARK FOUNDATION: $10k → 14%MILLENIUM PARK FOUNDATION: $10k → 14%MILENNIUM PARK FOUNDATION: $10k → 14%THE JOFFREY BALLET: $3k → 14%THE JOFFREY BALLET: $3k → 14%THE JOFFREY BALLET: $3k → 14%0%20%40%50%more need →
grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount
How this is measured
Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty line in the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP.
How this is measured
US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are delivered. Need from public data (U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA), shown as context about the area, never attributed to the funder’s giving.
03Its grantees
repeat funding

Who it funds again

Organizations funded in more than one year, against those funded once.

46%of every dollar goes to organizations it has funded before.
$288k · 6 repeat orgs$335k to everyone else

Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +147% since the first grant, against +43% for those funded once.

6 repeat relationships: 1 still active in FY2025, 5 since wound down; 1 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

6
13

Total granted

$288k
$333k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+147%
+43%

Still filing today

100%
62%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2025, 71% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $2k went to new ones.

50%100%’20’21’22’23’24’25
RenewedFirst-time

Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant

’20’21’22’23’24’25
Arts & CultureEducationRecreation & SportsInternationalOther
How this is measured
First-time means a grantee’s first year in the filing window; renewed means funded in an earlier year too. The renewed share climbs naturally as a portfolio matures, so the signal is a year that bucks it (a wave of new grantees). 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

  • TP
    THE PERLMAN MUSIC PROGRAM INC
    3× · 2021–2024 · $100k · revenue +147%
  • CS
    Chicago Symphony Orchestra
    3× · 2021–2024 · $75k · revenue +15%
  • MS
    MERIT SCHOOL OF MUSIC
    3× · 2020–2025 · $55k · revenue ×16

Funded once

  • LO
    Lyric Opera of Chicagograduated
    one grant, 2021 · $200k · revenue +72%
  • GI
    GICHIGAMIIN INDIGENOUS NATIONS MUSEUM INCgraduated
    one grant, 2021 · $36k · revenue +382%
  • TA
    THE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGOgraduated
    one grant, 2021 · $34k · revenue +43%
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.

04Its field

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.

1
Music Institute of Chicago

The music institute of chicago ("music institute") leads people toward a lifelong engagement with music, by providing widely accessible resources for high quality music teaching, performing, and service activities.

Arts & Culture
2
Chicago Opera Theater

Chicago opera theater expands the tradition of opera as a living art form by engaging lovers of music and storytelling through innovative experiences, predominantly of new and rarely performed works.

Arts & Culture
3
Cleveland Institute of Music

The cleveland institute of music's mission is to empower the world's most talented classical music students to fulfill their dreams and potential.

Education
4
Musicmi

At MusicMi we set a mission for ourselves to provide aspiring young musicians from across the country with an opportunity to study with world-class artists and to provide our students with a music education of the highest artistic…

Arts & Culture
5
Classical Music Chicago

Presenting free high-quality classical music performances and music education experiences in the Chicago metropolitan area for people of all ages and degrees of musical awareness so they can experience how music enriches life.

Arts & Culture
6
Foundation for Modern Opera
—
7
Manhattan School of Music

Manhattan school of music is deeply committed to excellence in education, performance, and creative activity; to the humanity of the school's environment; and to the cultural enrichment of the larger community. a premiere international…

Arts & Culture
8
Chicago Sinfonietta Inc

Chicago Sinfonietta is a professional orchestra dedicated to modeling and promoting diversity, inclusion, and both racial and cultural equity in the arts through the universal language of symphonic music. Our core values are built around…

Arts & Culture
9
Illinois Philharmonic Orchestra

Illinois Philharmonic Orchestra's mission as a professional orchestra is to utilize the universal expression of music to create profound, inspiring, and personal connections between the people and communities of Chicagos Southland.

Arts & Culture
10
Chamber Opera of Chicago
—
11
Florida Grand Opera Inc

The mission of florida grand opera is to enrich people's lives through an awareness and deeper appreciation of opera while supporting the operations of the greater miami opera and the opera guild, inc. by expanding its reach to diverse…

Arts & Culture
12
String Insiders

String Insiders' mission is to inspire violin, viola, and cello students through online and in-person connections to teachers, peers, and a wealth of information that challenges and encourages them in their growth as a musician and helps…

Human Services
How this is measured
The grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Chicago School of Violin Making Inc; the most unlike its peers is New Israel Fund. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
04the grantee network

16 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2026.

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 2026, not grant rows in a single year, so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 16 of the 21 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.

0
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
5
Early backer (in before they grew)
16/16
Grantees still filing
11/16
Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

Lyric Opera of Chicago: $200,000 · Arts & CultureLyric Opera of ChicagoTHE PERLMAN MUSIC PROGRAM INC: $100,000 · Arts & CultureTHE PERLMAN MUSIC PROGRAM INCChicago Symphony Orchestra: $75,000 · Arts & CultureChicago Symphony OrchestraMERIT SCHOOL OF MUSIC: $55,009 · Arts & CultureMERIT SCHOOL OF MUSICGICHIGAMIIN INDIGENOUS NATIONS MUSEUM INC: $36,000 · Arts & CultureGICHIGAMIIN INDIGENOUS NATIONS MUSEUM INC+5 more: $25,500 · Arts & CultureTHE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO: $34,000 · EducationCHICAGO SCHOOL OF VIOLIN MAKING INC: $10,000 · EducationSouthern Methodist University: $2,000 · EducationMILLENNIUM PARK FOUNDATION: $40,000 · Recreation & SportsCONGREGATION SUKKAT SHALOM: $15,000 · OtherIndividual grant recipient: $12,000 · OtherARTSMART: $10,000 · OtherIndividual grant recipient: $2,500 · Other+1 more: $500 · OtherNEW ISRAEL FUND: $5,000 · InternationalWASHINGTON INSTITUTE FOR NEAR EAST POLICY: $5,000 · International
Arts & Culture$491,509Education$46,000Recreation & Sports$40,000Other$40,000International$10,000

Each grantee by its size and the funder’s share of it; top left is load-bearing

25%50%75%100%$1.0M$10M$100Mgrantee revenue →↑ funder's share of their budgetLyric Opera of Chicago: $200,000 over 1y, 0.4% of budgetTHE PERLMAN MUSIC PROGRAM INC: $100,000 over 3y, 4.2% of budgetChicago Symphony Orchestra: $75,000 over 3y, 0.0% of budgetMERIT SCHOOL OF MUSIC: $55,009 over 3y, 2.9% of budgetMILLENNIUM PARK FOUNDATION: $40,000 over 4y, 0.7% of budgetGICHIGAMIIN INDIGENOUS NATIONS MUSEUM INC: $36,000 over 1y, 17% of budgetTHE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO: $34,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetARTSMART: $10,000 over 1y, 2.3% of budgetCHICAGO SCHOOL OF VIOLIN MAKING INC: $10,000 over 2y, 1.6% of budgetTHE JOFFREY BALLET: $7,500 over 3y, 0.0% of budgetNEW ISRAEL FUND: $5,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetWASHINGTON INSTITUTE FOR NEAR EAST POLICY: $5,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetPALM BEACH OPERA INC: $5,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetMount Vernon Virtuosi Inc: $2,500 over 1y, 0.9% of budgetSouthern Methodist University: $2,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetMidwest Young Artists: $500 over 1y, 0.0% of budget
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.

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.

The Chicago Community…Donor Advised Charita…Fidelity Investments …Amazonsmile Foundation
The Chicago Community TrustIL12.4× affinity4 shared granteesties to 3 of 3Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: The Chicago Community Trust · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund · Amazonsmile Foundation

How this is measured
Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. Overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.

How much its grantees rely on government

Each dot is one organization Howard L Gottlieb Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from Howard L Gottlieb Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.

2024
’20’21’22’23’24’25
no gov · 00%1%5%11%20%funder's share of their income ↑0%3%5%8%10%share of the org’s income from government →
    no gov moneyreceives it· size = income
    0get no government money at all
    4report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)
    0rely on government for over half their income
    ⤢ axis zoomed · 0–10%
    typical government reliance, FY20–25
    How this is measured
    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 a grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first, a floor rather than 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 to 24 months.
    05Through Plinth

    Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

    How do I get to Howard L Gottlieb Foundation?

    Find your warmest path to Howard L Gottlieb 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.

    On method. Every financial figure here is read from IRS e-file XML, the funder’s own 990/990-PF, and from the multi-year returns of the 21 grantees we resolved, each linked to its source. Grantee outcomes are each organization’s own program-service reporting (Form 990, Part III), read as association with funding, never as caused by it. Low-confidence name matches are suppressed rather than guessed. How we build these →

    How this is measured
    Each figure carries one of six labels. Filed is what the funder reported on its return. Official is another government record about an organization, such as a federal award or a charity register, joined by name where no shared identifier exists. Resolved is an identity we worked out where the filing named a recipient without an EIN, kept only above a measured confidence threshold. Computed is arithmetic over those, like themes, portfolio clusters and co-funder strength. Context is a statistic about a place rather than about an organization, which is what the need overlay is: it describes the area a grantee’s address sits in, not where its work lands. Inferred is drawn by a model from text, like the partnerships read out of public news and organization websites. Each is labeled where it appears.

    Generated from the IRS Form 990-PF e-file return for fiscal year 2025, released 2025. Filings run roughly 12 to 24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

    Source object · view filing

    Play a game based on Howard L Gottlieb’s filings →

    More from the funding graph

    The unnamed billions
    grants reported with no recipient in the public record
    The regranting layer
    51% of grant dollars land in the regranting layer
    The DAF merry-go-round
    $9.7B circulates between donor-advised funds
    The endowment market
    who holds foundation money, and what just moved
    The camps
    funders cluster by geography, not ideology
    By state
    where grant money is based, and what stays home