· Private foundation
Joseph P Donahue Charitable 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 $10k60 grants · $166k
- $10k–50k8 grants · $147k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| LOWELL PARKS & CONSERVATION TRUST | $30,000 |
| OFF THE PARK PRESS | $26,425 |
| Individual grant recipient | $25,000 |
| ORCHARD VALLEY WALDORF SCHOOL | $25,000 |
| CHURCH OF THE GOOD SHEPHERD | $11,000 |
| BROTHER SULLIVAN FUND | $10,000 |
| Individual grant recipient | $10,000 |
| FRACTURED ATLAS | $10,000 |
| LOWELL FESTIVAL FOUNDATION FALL FES | $8,000 |
| WHITE RIVER PARTNERSHIP | $7,000 |
| GREENVILLE JUNCTION DEPOT FRIENDS | $6,000 |
| LITTER KREWE CORP | $6,000 |
| WALDORF SCHOOL OF LEXINGTON | $6,000 |
| CENTRAL CATHOLIC HIGH SCHOOL | $6,000 |
| BRIDGTON ACADEMY | $6,000 |
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.
Your human-services grants (FY19–24, $13k) land where the poverty rate runs at 9%, against an area that typically sits at 9%. 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.
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.
And the relationships you keep tend to grow: grantees you re-up on have seen median revenue of +39% since the first grant, against +10% for the ones you funded once.
78 repeat relationships — 52 still active in FY2024, 26 since wound down; 16 grantees were first funded in FY2024 (too recent to call).
How the two cohorts compare
Organizations
Total granted
Median revenue growth · since first grant
Still filing today
New vs renewed · share of each year
In FY2024, 84% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $51k 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
- OVORCHARD VALLEY WALDORF SCHOOL INC7× · 2017–2024 · $180k · revenue +57%
- LPLOWELL PARKS & CONSERVATION TRUST7× · 2017–2024 · $109k · revenue +407%
- PVPioneer Valley Poetry Productions Inc5× · 2018–2023 · $80k · revenue +123% · 93% of their budget
Funded once
- IGIndividual grant recipientone grant, 2017 · $10k
- GHGOLDEN HANDCUFFS REVIEW PUBLICATIONSone grant, 2018 · $10k
- SOSELVA OSCURA CO KEN TAYLORone grant, 2018 · $10k
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.
Protect land along rivers, lakes and wetlands of vt; protect public access, wildlife habitat, scenic natural beauty, and ecological integrity.
To protect and enhance the natural resources of vermont in order to promote the well-being of present and future generations of vermonters and visitors; preserve and aid in the preservation of open land along rivers and lakes; protect and…
The Organization works with local landowners to permanently protect natural land and waters that define its community and enrich the quality of life by purchasing, managing, negotiating and developing conservations easements in the Upper…
Rooted in vermont since 1977, the vermont land trust unites land and lives for the enduring benefit of people and the place we share. we help people protect, care for, and connect to land. this includes the farms, forests, natural areas,…
Provide nature-based education and mentoring to youth and adults in southern vermont and western massachusetts.
The mission of Midcoast Conservancy is to protect vital lands and waters on a scale that matters and to inspire wonder and action on behalf of all species and the Earth.
Vermont public informs, educates, and entertains through public service journalism and enlightening content rooted in vermont. our storytelling enriches lives and fosters community connection and understanding.
Kennebunk Land Trust's mission is to permanently conserve and steward land to benefit natural and human communities.
To cultivate connection, share resources, and amplify the voices of people of color in vermont within the focus areas of land, environ- ment, agriculture, and foodways. liberation ecosystem, inc. is a col- laborative ecosystem for growing…
Sudbury valley trustees, inc. ("the organization") works to protect natural areas and farmland for wildlife and people in the 36 communities that surround the sudbury, assabet, and concord rivers. the organization cares for some of the…
The mission of the mount desert land & garden preserve is to conserve and share the beauty of our historic lands and gardens.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Lowell Parks & Conservation Trust and the most unlike its peers is Dos Madres Press Inc. 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.
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 36 years old; the field is 16. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 22% startups (under 5 years old) — 4% of your grantees by number, and just 1% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 2% lost their exemption, against 13% of the field you don’t fund.
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.
58 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. 58 of the 134 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 ORCHARD VALLEY WALDORF SCHOOL INC ↗
- Who funds LOWELL PARKS & CONSERVATION TRUST ↗
- Who funds Pioneer Valley Poetry Productions Inc ↗
- Who funds Greater Lowell Community Foundation Inc ↗
- Who funds Mahoosuc Land Trust Inc ↗
- Who funds THE INITIATIVE A VERMONT WALDORF HIGH SCHOOL ↗
- Who funds GREENVILLE JUNCTION DEPOT FRIENDS ↗
- Who funds Natural Resources Council of Maine Inc ↗
- Who funds MOOSEHEAD MARINE MUSEUM ↗
- Who funds UPPER VALLEY SNOW SPORTS FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds Bridgton Academy ↗
- Who funds THE LOWELL FESTIVAL FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds CENTRAL CATHOLIC HIGH SCHOOL OF LAWRENCE INC ↗
- Who funds MAINE ADAPTIVE SPORTS & RECREATION ↗
- Who funds UTEC Inc ↗
- Who funds GOOD SAMARITAN HAVEN INC ↗
- Who funds White River Partnership Inc ↗
- Who funds CLEMMONS FAMILY FARM INC ↗
- Who funds Merrimack Repertory Theatre Inc ↗
- Who funds SCRAG MOUNTAIN MUSIC 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 Vermont Community Foundation · Ben & Jerry's Foundation Inc · Fidelity Foundation · Eastern Bank Foundation · Aubert J Fay Charitable Fund · Richard K & Nancy L Donahue Charitable Foundation · Theodore Edson Parker Foundation · Demoulas Foundation · We Share A Common Thread Foundation Inc · Greater Lowell Community Foundation Inc · Salem Five Charitable Foundation Inc · Cummings Foundation Grants Inc (Fka Oneworld Boston Inc)
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 Joseph P Donahue Charitable 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.
- Another Way Inc — 74% of income from government
- Good Samaritan Haven Inc — 63% of income from government
- Prevent Child Abuse Vermont — 58% of income from government
- Utec Inc — 46% of income from government
- Upper Valley Haven — 38% of income from government
- Boys & Girls Club of Greater Lowell Inc — 27% of income from government
- Vermont Council On the Arts Inc — 20% of income from government
- Greater Lowell Community Foundation Inc — 18% of income from government
- The Green Mountain Club Inc Debonis — 17% of income from government
- The Lowell Festival Foundation — 12% of income from government
- Orchard Valley Waldorf School Inc — 10% of income from government
- Clemmons Family Farm Inc — 9% of income from government
- Mill City Grows Inc — 7% of income from government
- Friends of the Winooski River Inc — 7% of income from government
- Northern Stage Company — 5% of income from government
- White River Partnership Inc — 4% of income from government
- Merrimack Valley Food Bank Inc — 3% of income from government
- Girls Incorporated of Greater Lowell — 3% of income from government
- Shelburne Farms — 3% of income from government
- Merrimack Repertory Theatre Inc — 2% of income from government
- Resist Inc — 2% of income from government
- Noise Pollution Clearinghouse Inc — 1% of income from government
- Appalachian Mountain Club — 1% of income from government
- Lake Champlain Land Trust Inc — 1% of income from government
- Als One Inc — 1% of income from government
- Central Catholic High School of Lawrence Inc — 0% 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.
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