How much did JOHN SAGE FOUNDATION grant in FY2024?

Environment$324kAnimals$32kArts & Culture$19kEducation$9kHealth$8kFood & Nutrition$5kScience & Tech$4kRecreation & Sports$3kHuman Services$3kOther$156k

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

accessenvironmental educationwater testingland acquisition

2020

environmental educationenvironmental researchland acquisitionwater

2021

environmental researchenvironmental educationland acquisition

2022

mountaincampmonitoringwater

2023

awardlakeconservancy

2024

awardsoilconservation

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

03FY2024 · 18 grants

Where the money goes

Your grants by size, and where they go.

By grant size · FY2024

Under $10k15 grants · $64k
$10k–50k3 grants · $30k

$5,000

Median grant

States reached

$5.9M

Total assets

Largest grants

SEBASTICOOK REGIONAL LAND TRUST$10,000
SOMERSET WOODS TRUSTEES$10,000
NORTHEAST WILDERNESS TRUST$10,000
LAKE STEWARDS OF MAINE$6,500
PISCATAQUIS COUNTY SOIL & CONSERVATION DISTRICT$6,200
MAINE TREE FOUNDATION$6,000
CHEBEAGUE & CUMBERLAND LAND TRUST$5,000
WILD SEED PROJECT$5,000
MAINE APPALACHAIN TRAIL LAND TRUST$5,000
FRIENDS OF BAXTER STATE PARK$5,000
LOUDS ISLAND CONSERVANCY$4,000
BANGOR AREA STORMWATER GROUP$4,000
30 MILE RIVER WATERSHED ASSOCIATION$4,000
CHINA REGION LAKES ALLIANCE$3,000
HANCOCK COUNTY SOIL & WATER CONSERVATION$3,000

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 (FY24–24, $3k) land where the poverty rate runs at 9% — the area typically sits at 11%. 0% of those dollars reach neighborhoods with above-average need. Your grants skew toward lower-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.

56%of every dollar goes to organizations you’ve funded before.

$315k · 27 repeat orgs$246k to everyone else

27 repeat relationships — 9 still active in FY2024, 18 since wound down; 9 grantees were first funded in FY2024 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

Total granted

$315k

$199k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+69%

+78%

Still filing today

81%

60%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2024, 50% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $47k went to new ones.

RenewedFirst-time

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

EnvironmentAnimalsEducationArts & CultureRecreation & SportsFood & NutritionOther

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

MIDCOAST CONSERVANCY
4× · 2019–2023 · $30k · revenue +64%
FO
FRIENDS OF BAXTER STATE PARK
5× · 2020–2024 · $23k · revenue +16%
3M
30 MILE RIVER WATERSHED ASSOCIATION
3× · 2018–2024 · $18k · revenue +190%

Funded once

FB
FRENCHMAN BAY CONSERVANCYgraduated
one grant, 2023 · $21k · revenue +134%
AL
ANDROSCOGGIN LAND TRUST
one grant, 2022 · $8k · revenue -37%
SC
SOMERSET COUNTY SOIL & WATER CONSERVATION DISTRICT
one grant, 2018 · $8k

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.

Kennebunkport Conservation Trust

The Trust is dedicated to preserving land for use by current and future generations, and to managing properties in a way that reflects the natural and cultural heritage of Kennebunkport.

Environment

Kennebunk Land Trust

Kennebunk Land Trust's mission is to permanently conserve and steward land to benefit natural and human communities.

Environment

Boothbay Region Land Trust

To conserve for the public benefit natural habitat, scenic beauty, and working land of the Boothbay region of Maine by providing stewardship, public access, and environmental programs.

Environment

Coastal Rivers Conservation Trust

Conservation & education - The benefit and enjoyment of the general public, to promote the preservation and conservation of the natural, cultural, and historic resources of the Damariscotta-Pemaquid Region, research and scientific study,…

Environment

Royal River Conservation Trust

The royal river conservation trust (rrct) is a regional land trust working primarily in seven maine municipalities. the trust owns,cares for, and stewards land and conservation easements to protect land and water resources for the general…

Environment

Islesboro Islands Trust

Islesboro Island Trust is a nonprofit land trust serving the community of Islesboro in Maine's Penobscot Bay. Founded in 1985, the mission is to enhance the quality of residents' lives through the preservation of open space, educate all…

Philanthropy

Mahoosuc Land Trust Inc

To protect and conserve land and traditional land uses including farming, recreation, significant habitats, scenery, and water resources for the benefit of the public. The organization facilitates community-based conserv

Environment

Presumpscot Regional Land Trust

We engage with communities to conserve, steward, and provide access to local lands and clean water for current and future generations to enjoy.

—

Cape Elizabeth Land Trust

The Cape Elizabeth Land Trust permanently conserves and provides tewardship for lands and easements located in Cape Elizabeth, Maine.

Environment

Piscataquog Land Conservancy

PLC is a nonprofit land conservation organization founded in 1970. Its purpose is to conserve the natural and scenic environment of the Piscataquog, Souhegan and Nashua River watershed communities of southern NH.

—

Upper Saco Valley Land Trust

The Organization works with local landowners to permanently protect natural land and water.

Food & Nutrition

Harpswell Heritage Land Trust

Land Conservation

Environment

For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Coastal Mountains Land Trust and the most unlike its peers is Unity Environmental University. 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.

the sector your giving your giving is ahead of the sector the sector’s ahead of you· dot size = how much the theme matters to each side

Ordered by the change in your giving — leaning in on top, pulling back at the bottom. The bar between the two dots is how out of step you are with the sector. Hover any row for detail.

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 30 years old; the field is 20. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.

The field is 17% startups (under 5 years old) — 2% of your grantees by number, and just 1% of your money.

Closures · last 5 years

The orgs you fund almost never close — 0.0% lost their exemption, against 8% of the field you don’t fund.

orgs you fund

0.0%0/58

the rest of the field

509/6,580

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

54 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)

53/54

Grantees still filing

43/54

Grew since you first funded

Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee

Environment$323,650Other$164,660Animals$32,000Arts & Culture$18,750Education$8,730Health$7,500Food & Nutrition$5,000

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.

Davis Conservation FoundationME89.9× affinity40 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Davis Conservation Foundation · Maine Community Foundation Inc · Onion Foundation · Elmina B Sewall Foundation · Quimby Family Foundation · The Nature Conservancy · Momentum Conservation · Fields Pond Foundation Inc · Fidelity Foundation · Maine Coast Heritage Trust · Stephen & Tabitha King Foundation Inc · Bangor Savings Bank 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 JOHN SAGE 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

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: CHINA REGION LAKES ALLIANCE.

Agentic due diligence · confidence × risk

Financial management

insufficient risk

Limited financial data in public filings.

Track record & reputation

low risk

6 years of Form 990 filings, still active.

Legal standing

low risk

US 501(c)(3); EIN 010498816 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 CHINA REGION LAKES ALLIANCE, 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.
WatchSustained operations— Filing through 2024; revenue contracted over the period.
On trackReliance on your funding— Your grants peaked at 11% of their budget — diversified.
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 John Sage Foundation?

Find your warmest path to John Sage 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.

JOHN SAGE 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

54 grantees, every filing reconciled, 2017–2025.

Government reliance of your grantees

Your grantmaking, live and operational

How do I get to John Sage Foundation?

More from the funding graph

JOHN SAGE 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

54 grantees, every filing reconciled, 2017–2025.

Government reliance of your grantees

Your grantmaking, live and operational

How do I get to John Sage Foundation?

More from the funding graph