· Private foundation
Jonathan Merage Foundation
Its FY2023 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.
Read this first · the figures below need context
93% of Jonathan Merage Foundation’s FY2023 grant dollars went to National Philanthropic Trust, not to grantees.
Its money now reaches organizations through that sponsor, which does not report who recommended each grant. FY2023 names 1 organization directly, so a portfolio cannot be read from it. Everything below is therefore FY2018, the last year Jonathan Merage Foundation named its own grantees at scale: 5 organizations, $209k. It is dated, not current.
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 FY2017–2023.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2018
- Under $10k5 grants · $10k
- $50k–250k2 grants · $199k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| Denver Botanic Gardens | $100,000 |
| JPM Charitable Giving Fund | $99,000 |
| National Jewish Health | $5,000 |
| University of Oklahoma Foundation | $3,000 |
| Black Cube | $1,000 |
| Executive Partnering to Invest in C | $500 |
| Early Learning Ventures | $100 |
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 (FY23–23, $50k) land where the poverty rate runs at 17%, against an area that typically sits at 8%. 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.
Which US states your grants reach
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.
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.
Biu produces students who excel in the sciences, humanities, law, engineering, business & the arts.
The jewish agency binds jews across ideologies and civilizations together in a worldwide jewish family with israel at its center. it provides the global framework for aliyah, ensures global jewish safety, strengthens jewish identity and…
Support the hebrew univ. of jerusalem, israel's foremost center of higher edu. & research.
Based on jewish values, the jewish federation of greater los angeles convenes and leads the community and leverages its resources to assure the continuity of the jewish people, support a secure state of israel, care for jews in need here…
We steward $1.5 billion in charitable assets through donor-advised funds, endowments, and other giving vehicles. partnering with 1,400 individuals, families, and organizations, we build enduring legacies and multigenerational impact. in…
The weizmann institute of science, located in rehovot, israel, is one of the worlds top-ranking, multidisciplinary research institutions. at any one time, several thousand scientists, staff and students are involved in hundreds of research…
Our vision is to reignite the zionist spirit and meet the needs of jewish civilization in the twenty-first century by connecting people around the world through the vibrancy and creativity of contemporary israeli culture.
AJC's mission is to enhance the wellbeing of the Jewish people and Israel, and to advance human rights and democratic values in the United States and around the world. In pursuit of this mission, AJC advances democratic principles, fights…
We fundraise in the u.s. to support, and raise awareness of, bar-ilan university in israel.
Jlens empowers investors to align their capital with jewish values and advocates for jewish communal priorities in the corporate arena. (see sch. o)jlens promotes investing through a jewish lens and aims to increase the jewish community's…
Hillel of Colorado seeks to engage, empower, and work with Jewish college students to create Jewish communities at University of Denver, Colorado State University, Auraria Campus, Colorado School of Mines and other front range…
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is National Philanthropic Trust and the most unlike its peers is Black Cube. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
12 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. 12 of the 16 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 NATIONAL PHILANTHROPIC TRUST ↗
- Who funds DENVER BOTANIC GARDENS INC ↗
- Who funds JEWISHColorado ↗
- Who funds COLORADO STATE UNIVERSITY FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds BELEV ECHAD INC ↗
- Who funds AMERICAN FRIENDS OF KISHORIT INC ↗
- Who funds HIAS INC ↗
- Who funds NATIONAL JEWISH HEALTH ↗
- Who funds ANTI-DEFAMATION LEAGUE ↗
- Who funds UNIVERSITY OF OKLAHOMA FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds BLACK CUBE ↗
- Who funds EARLY LEARNING VENTURES ↗
Government reliance of your grantees
Every dot is one organization Jonathan Merage 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.
- Hias Inc — 88% 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.
Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus
How do I get to Jonathan Merage Foundation?
Find your warmest path to Jonathan Merage 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.