How much did ILLINOIS EQUAL JUSTICE FOUNDATION grant in FY2024?

Crime & Legal$35MHuman Services$7.9MEducation$492kEmployment$205kHousing & Shelter$190kCommunity Improvement$173kHealth$90kCivil Rights$50kPublic Benefit$30kOther$6.8M

02beneath the categories

Past the labels — and the year it shifted

Beneath the NTEE codes, this is what the grant descriptions actually say.

…and in their own words, year by year

2019

make takecasesthousandstake hotlinehotline referralsdaleysmall

2020

make takecasesthousandstake hotlinehotline referralsoutreach knowchicago neighborhoods

2021

landlords housingdue pandemiccriminalization cannabisimpacted criminalizationhousing instabilityinstability dueimpacted housing

2022

leaf informationdue pandemichousing instabilitycriminalization cannabisimpacted criminalizationinstability dueimpacted housing

2023

due pandemichousing instabilitycriminalization cannabisinstability dueimpacted criminalizationimpacted housinglandlords homeowners

2024

representation evictioneviction mattersimmigrationdue pandemichousing instabilitycriminalization cannabisinstability due

2025

advocacysexualrepresentation evictioneviction mattersjustice-involvedimmigrationdue pandemic

Words distinctive to each year’s grant purposes (TF-IDF) · event-driven terms in cyan.

03FY2024 · 49 grants

Where the money goes

Your grants by size, and where they go.

By grant size · FY2024

$10k–50k25 grants · $635k
$50k–250k17 grants · $2.2M
$250k+7 grants · $10M

$42,500

Median grant

States reached

$11M

Total assets

Largest grants

LAND OF LINCOLN LEGAL AID$3,850,343
PRAIRIE STATE LEGAL SERVICES$3,559,741
COORDINATED ADVICE & REFERRAL PROGRAM FOR LEGAL SERVICES$940,820
LEGAL AID CHICAGO$776,088
DISPUTE RESOLUTION INSTITUTE$681,713
CHICAGO VOLUNTEER LEGAL SERVICES$380,263
METROPOLITAN FAMILY SERVICESLEGAL AID SOCIETY$283,969
IL LEGAL AID ONLINE$234,502
EQUIP FOR EQUALITY$220,000
GREATER CHICAGO LEGAL CLINIC$215,000
NORTH SUBURBAN LEGAL AID CLINIC$205,536
CABRINI GREEN LEGAL AID$205,000
RESOLUTION SYSTEMS INSTITUTE$204,029
LAW CENTER FOR BETTER HOUSING$134,000
JAMES B MORAN CENTER FOR YOUTH ADVOCACY$130,000

02The need

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.

show:

Your human-services grants (FY18–24, $7.9M) land where the poverty rate runs at 14% — the area typically sits at 10%. 100% of those dollars reach neighborhoods with above-average need. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount

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; 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, United Way ALICE — shown as context about the area, never attributed to your giving.

03Your edge

repeat funding

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.

99%of every dollar goes to organizations you’ve funded before.

$51M · 49 repeat orgs$524k to everyone else

And the relationships you keep tend to grow: grantees you re-up on have seen median revenue of +102% since the first grant, against +41% for the ones you funded once.

49 repeat relationships — 39 still active in FY2024, 10 since wound down; 10 grantees were first funded in FY2024 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

Total granted

$51M

$258k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+102%

+41%

Still filing today

86%

57%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2024, 98% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $266k went to new ones.

RenewedFirst-time

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

Crime & LegalHuman ServicesEducationHousing & ShelterEmploymentCivil RightsOther

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

LO
Land of Lincoln Legal Assistance Foundation
7× · 2018–2024 · $13M · revenue +141%
PS
Prairie State Legal Services
7× · 2018–2024 · $12M · revenue +102%
CA
Coordinated Advice & Referral Program for Legal Services
7× · 2018–2024 · $5.7M · revenue +170% · 30% of their budget

Funded once

CM
CHINESE MUTUAL AID ASSOCIATIONgraduated
one grant, 2022 · $78k · revenue +41%
PE
PUBLIC EQUIITY
one grant, 2022 · $60k
UO
University of IL Community Preservation Clinic
one grant, 2018 · $40k

Repeat = funded in two or more distinct years; growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.

04Your field

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.

Lakeshore Legal Aid

Standing with our neighbors, Lakeshore Legal Aid fights poverty and injustice through advocacy and by providing meaningful and dignified access to the legal system.

Crime & Legal

Inner City Law Center

Fighting for justice and housing by providing legal representation for the homeless and working poor.

Crime & Legal

Chicago United for Equity

Connecting and amplifying the power of individuals to build a just, equitable, and inclusive city.

Civil Rights

Chicago Committee On Minorities in Large

The chicago committee on minorities in large law firm seeks racial and ethnic diversity in the legal profession by collaborating with its membership to drive sustainable institutional change at law firms and corporate legal departments and…

Civil Rights

Latino Union of Chicago

Latino Union works to defend the rights and dignity of contingent workers, including the right to immigrate, work, live free of oppression and violence, and provide for oneself and one's family.

Human Services

Equal Justice Center

The Equal Justice Center is a non-profit law firm and employment justice organization which empowers low-income families, workers, and communities to achieve fair treatment in the workplace, in the justice system, and in our shared society…

Civil Rights

Illinois Coalition for Legal Reform

Advocate for tort reform in Illinois by communicating with public officials and staff to influence legislation and administrative action designed to create a more equitable and balanced judicial system in Illinois.

Community Improvement

Chicago Refugee Coalition

The Chicago Refugee Coalition is a 501c3 non-profit organization dedicated ot the alleviation of human suffering through innovative partnerships, advocacy and community empowerment.

Human Services

Neighborhood Legal Services

A steadfast advocate for individuals, families, and communities throughout LA County.

—

The Public Interest Law Center

The Public Interest Law Center uses high-impact legal strategies to advance the civil, social, and economic rights of communities in the Philadelphia region facing discrimination, inequality, and poverty. We use litigation, community…

Crime & Legal

Illinois Equal Justice Foundation

The illinois equal justice foundation funds civil legal aid in illinois to champion the rights of those burdened by barriers to justice. we envision equitable access to and navigation of the illinois civil legal system.

—

Illinois Community for Displaced

Serving recently arrived migrants and asylum seekers in the Chicagoland area and is committed to upholding the dignity and human rights of immigrants.

Human Services

For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Legal Aid Chicago and the most unlike its peers is Lester and Rosalie Anixter Center. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.

Your grantees are a median of 41 years old; the field is 17. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.

The field is 21% startups (under 5 years old) — 5% of your grantees by number, and just 1% of your money.

Closures · last 5 years

The orgs you fund almost never close — 2% lost their exemption, against 14% of the field you don’t fund.

orgs you fund

2%1/66

the rest of the field

14%

4,320/31,444

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.

05the grantee network

60 grantees, every filing reconciled, 2017–2025.

Each one resolved to its own IRS returns and tracked year by year — your grant beside their revenue.

Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)

Early backer (in before they grew)

55/60

Grantees still filing

53/60

Grew since you first funded

Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee

Crime & Legal$35,364,597Human Services$7,866,805Other$6,952,649Education$492,183Employment$205,000Housing & Shelter$190,000Community Improvement$172,510

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.

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.

Lawyers Trust Fund of IllinoisIL76.6× affinity33 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Lawyers Trust Fund of Illinois · The Chicago Bar Foundation · Polk Bros Foundation Inc · United Way of Metropolitan Chicago Inc · The Chicago Community Trust · Public Interest Law Initiative · The Sidley Austin Foundation · Chicago Foundation for Women · The Resurrection Project · Equal Justice Works · John D and Catherine T Macarthur · Illinois Bar 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 organisation ILLINOIS EQUAL JUSTICE 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.

2024

’20’21’22’23’24

no gov moneyreceives it· size = income

0get no government money at all

0rely on government for over half their income

⤢ axis zoomed · 0–90%

typical government reliance, FY20–24

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. 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.

05Through Plinth

Through Plinth

Your grantmaking, live and operational

This dossier was generated cold from public filings. In Plinth it’s a working system — every applicant assessed and every grant monitored. Here’s a taste, run on one of your grantees: University of IL at Chicago School of Law.

Agentic due diligence · confidence × risk

Financial management

insufficient risk

Limited financial data in public filings.

Track record & reputation

high risk

4 years of Form 990 filings, no recent filing.

Legal standing

medium risk

US 501(c)(3); EIN 362371220 on file with current IRS Form 990 filings.

Governance

Live in Plinth

Board composition & governance documents — verified live in Plinth from the applicant.

Compliance & sanctions

Live in Plinth

OFAC / UN sanctions screening — run live in Plinth at assessment.

Program capacity

Live in Plinth

Staffing, M&E and activity alignment — assessed live in Plinth from submitted proposals.

Live · Plinth’s real DD engine

Run the actual assessment on University of IL at Chicago School of Law, cold from public data.

Generated live from public IRS filings + open web sources by Plinth’s agentic engine. Shown as an illustration of the product, not a formal assessment.

Post-award monitoring · continuous checks

Awaiting reportFinancial stability— Runway not derivable from filings.
FlagSustained operations— No recent filing on record.
WatchReliance on your funding— Your grants peaked at 70% of their budget — load-bearing; a dependency Plinth would track.
Awaiting reportEvidence of delivery— Plinth collects the grantee's own monitoring reports post-award.

What you see here is static and public. In Plinth it’s operational — the full six-pillar framework on every applicant (with their own documents + live registry and sanctions checks), monitoring dashboards on every award, custom board reports, and eligibility routing for intake.

Agentic due diligenceMonitoring dashboardsCustom board reportsEligibility routing

Preview generated from this grantee’s public IRS filings and independent reporting. Pillars marked “live in Plinth” require the applicant’s submitted documents. Shown as illustration, not a formal assessment.

Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPro

How do I get to Illinois Equal Justice Foundation?

Find your warmest path to Illinois Equal Justice Foundation through people who sit on both boards. Search for your organization and Plinth traces the introduction across shared trustees and officers.

Every link is a documented governance overlap in public IRS 990 filings — not a personal network — and each hop carries its own confidence tier. Low-confidence or distant paths are held back rather than guessed.

ILLINOIS EQUAL JUSTICE FOUNDATION

What you funded, over time

Past the labels — and the year it shifted

Where the money goes

Do your dollars go where the need is?

Who you back again

Backed again, and grew

Funded once

60 grantees, every filing reconciled, 2017–2025.

Government reliance of your grantees

Your grantmaking, live and operational

How do I get to Illinois Equal Justice Foundation?

More from the funding graph

ILLINOIS EQUAL JUSTICE FOUNDATION

What you funded, over time

Past the labels — and the year it shifted

Where the money goes

Do your dollars go where the need is?

Who you back again

Backed again, and grew

Funded once

60 grantees, every filing reconciled, 2017–2025.

Government reliance of your grantees

Your grantmaking, live and operational

How do I get to Illinois Equal Justice Foundation?

More from the funding graph