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Plinth

· Public charity

Maine Coast Heritage Trust

Maine Coast Heritage Trust advances the conservation of lands and waters in Maine to ensure ecological well-being and foster thriving communities.

$3.7M
Granted FY2024still arriving
16
Grants FY2024still arriving
5
States reached
$1.2M
Largest
01What you fundRead
02The needRead
03Your edgeRead
04Your fieldRead
01What you fund
01100% classified

What you funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2017–2024.

Environment$21MHousing & Shelter$160kPublic Benefit$24kArts & Culture$20k
02FY2024 · 16 grants

Where the money goes

Your grants by size, and where they go.

The 16 grants below total $3,308,716 — the rows itemised in this filing. The $3,664,989 headline is the total grant expense reported on the return, so the remaining $356,273 is giving the schedule does not break out: grants under the $5,000 itemisation floor, grants to individuals, and grants reported on other schedules. Every figure below describes the itemised rows only.

By grant size · FY2024

  • Under $10k1 grant · $800
  • $10k–50k7 grants · $147k
  • $50k–250k4 grants · $568k
  • $250k+4 grants · $2.6M
$115,000
Median grant
5
States reached
$312M
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
Biddeford Pool Land Trust$1,205,465
The Nature Conservancy$750,000
Downeast Salmon Federation$349,184
York Land Trust$288,441
The Forest Society of Maine$200,000
The Community School$127,835
Crabtree Neck Land Trust$125,000
Niweskok$115,000
Brunswick Topsham Land Trust$45,000
Somes-Meynell Wildlife Sanctuary$25,000
Midcoast Conservancy$20,000
Mi'kmaq Nation$20,000
US Fish & Wildlife$16,991
Legacy Investment Works LLC dba Legacy Philanthropy Works$10,000
New Learning Journey$10,000
02The need
03

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:

Dollar for dollar, your grants (FY17–24) land where the poverty rate runs at 10%, against an area that typically sits at 7%. 91% of your dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

area typical 7%The Nature Conservancy: $750k → 7%The Nature Conservancy: $842k → 7%York Land Trust: $181k → 9%Midcoast Conservancy: $103k → 9%Wright Pierce: $94k → 9%Kennebec Land Trust: $141k → 12%Maine Farmland Trust: $115k → 13%Town of Lubec: $63k → 16%Brunswick Topsham Land Trust: $45k → 7%Midcoast Conservancy: $100k → 9%Coastal Mountains Land Trust: $201k → 11%Maine Community Foundation: $200k → 11%Town of Machias: $174k → 16%Friends of Hope Cemetery & Woods: $50k → 9%Midcoast Conservancy: $50k → 9%Coastal Mountains Land Trust: $200k → 11%RF Jordan & Sons Construction: $133k → 11%The Forest Society of Maine: $200k → 15%Downeast Coastal Conservancy: $86k → 16%York Land Trust: $750k → 9%Coastal Mountains Land Trust: $105k → 11%Town of Stonington: $81k → 11%Niweskok: $115k → 15%York Land Trust: $288k → 9%Coastal Mountains Land Trust: $77k → 11%Biddeford Pool Land Trust: $8.2M → 9%Coastal Rivers Conservation Trust: $100k → 9%Frenchman Bay Conservancy: $289k → 11%Downeast Salmon Federation: $349k → 16%Royal River Conservation Trust: $65k → 7%Biddeford Pool Land Trust: $1.2M → 9%Atlantic Challenge Foundations Inc: $80k → 11%Frenchman Bay Conservancy: $239k → 11%Downeast Salmon Federation: $347k → 16%Frenchman Bay Conservancy: $140k → 11%Downeast Salmon Federation: $303k → 16%Crabtree Neck Land Trust: $125k → 11%Downeast Salmon Federation: $181k → 16%Schoodic Instititue at Acadia National Park: $2.0M → 11%Downeast Salmon Federation: $83k → 16%Frenchman Bay Conservancy: $114k → 11%Downeast Salmon Federation: $63k → 16%Friends of Acadia: $138k → 11%The Community School of Mount Desert Island: $523k → 11%Island Housing Trust: $160k → 11%The Community School: $128k → 11%Blue Hill Heritage Trust: $304k → 11%Blue Hill Heritage Trust: $211k → 11%0%20%40%50%more need →
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 linein 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 — 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.

79%of every dollar goes to organizations you’ve funded before.
$15M · 14 repeat orgs$4.1M to everyone else

14 repeat relationships — 7 still active in FY2024, 7 since wound down; 8 grantees were first funded in FY2024 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

14
21

Total granted

$15M
$3.5M

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+44%
+55%

Still filing today

100%
48%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2024, 80% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $522k went to new ones.

50%100%’17’18’19’20’21’22’23’24
RenewedFirst-time

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

’17’18’19’20’21’22’23’24
EnvironmentFood & NutritionArts & CultureAnimalsHousing & ShelterEducationOther

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

  • DOWNEAST SALMON FEDERATION
    7× · 2018–2024 · $1.3M · revenue +66% · 29% of their budget
  • YL
    YORK LAND TRUST
    4× · 2017–2024 · $1.3M · revenue +22% · 32% of their budget
  • FB
    Frenchman Bay Conservancy
    4× · 2017–2023 · $783k · revenue +249%

Funded once

  • SI
    SCHOODIC INSTITUTE AT ACADIA NATIONAL PARK
    one grant, 2017 · $2.0M · revenue -9% · 37% of their budget
  • SO
    State of Maine Department of Inland Fisheries & Wildlife
    one grant, 2023 · $245k
  • TO
    Town of Machias
    one grant, 2019 · $174k

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.

1
Wetlands Foundation
Environment
2
Chebeague & Cumberland Land Trust

Our mission is to permanently conserve and steward natural resources across our island and mainland communities for the benefit of current and future generations.

—
3
Kennebunk Land Trust

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

Environment
4
Sebasticook Regional Land Trust

The mission of the SRLT is to recognize and conserve the rich wild and workinglandscape of Central Maine's Sebasticook River watershed through conservation,stewardship and education. Our focal programs are land conservation for…

Environment
5
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
6
Islesboro Islands Trust

The mission of Islesboro Islands Trust is to enhance the quality of residents' lives through the preservation of open space, educate all residents as to the value of the island's natural ecosystems, and act as an environmental advocate on…

Philanthropy
7
Somerset Woods Trustees

To conserve lands with significant ecological or cultural resources and manage them in a sustainable way for public benefit.

Environment
8
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.

—
9
Piscataquog Land Conservancy

The Piscataquog Land Conservancy 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…

—
10
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 conservation.

Environment
11
Northcoast Regional Land Trust

Northcoast regional land trust is dedicated to the protection of working landscapes, farms, forests and grazing lands, and to the preservation and protection of land for its natural, educational, scenic and historic values.

Food & Nutrition
12
Aspetuck Land Trust

Founded in 1966, Aspetuck Land Trust is a non-profit membership ogranization whose mission is to protect land forever and connect people to the natural world.

Environment

For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Northeast Wilderness Trust Corporation and the most unlike its peers is Somes-Meynell Wildlife Sanctuary. 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.

← shrinkinggrowing →↓ leaning in → pulling backsteadyBehavioral Health & Disabil…Rural Healthcare ProvidersSailing and Yacht ClubsRural Emergency Ambulance S…Fraternal Lodge Organizatio…Community Food PantriesFamily Philanthropic Founda…Immigrant & Refugee ServicesYouth Recreation & Wellness…
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 38 years old; the field is 21. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.

THE FIELDby orgYOUR GRANTEESby number16%3%<5yr12%3%5–10yr20%12%10–20yr20%29%20–35yr15%44%35–55yr17%9%55yr+
THE FIELDby orgYOUR MONEYby value16%1%<5yr12%0%5–10yr20%4%10–20yr20%66%20–35yr15%21%35–55yr17%9%55yr+

The field is 16% startups (under 5 years old) — 3% 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 9% of the field you don’t fund.

orgs you fund
0.0%0/42
the rest of the field
9%
599/6,628

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.

04the grantee network

34 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. 34 of the 45 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.

4
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
10
Early backer (in before they grew)
34/34
Grantees still filing
19/34
Grew since you first funded

Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee

BIDDEFORD POOL LAND TRUST — $9,372,219 · EnvironmentBIDDEFORD POOL LAND TRUSTSCHOODIC INSTITUTE AT ACADIA NATIONAL PARK — $1,980,479 · EnvironmentSCHOODIC INSTITUTE AT ACADIA NATIONAL PARKYORK LAND TRUST — $1,250,941 · EnvironmentYORK LAND TRUSTFrenchman Bay Conservancy — $783,294 · EnvironmentCoastal Mountains Land Trust — $592,680 · Environment+16 more — $1,974,537 · Environment+16 moreTHE NATURE CONSERVANCY — $1,592,000 · OtherTHE NATURE CON…State of Maine Department of Inland Fisheries & Wildlife — $245,000 · OtherState of Maine…Town of Machias — $174,000 · OtherTown of Machia…RF Jordan & Sons Construction — $133,111 · OtherWright Pierce — $94,380 · Other+13 more — $440,902 · Other+13 moreDOWNEAST SALMON FEDERATION — $1,331,990 · AnimalsTHE COMMUNITY SCHOOL OF MOUNT DESERT — $650,800 · EducationMaine Farmland Trust — $154,650 · Food & NutritionNiweskok — $115,000 · Food & NutritionMaine Community Foundation Inc — $200,000 · PhilanthropyISLAND HOUSING TRUST — $160,000 · Housing & Shelter
Environment$15,954,150Other$2,679,393Animals$1,331,990Education$650,800Food & Nutrition$269,650Philanthropy$200,000Housing & Shelter$160,000

Each org by its size and your share of it — top-left is where you’re load-bearing

25%50%75%100%$1.0M$10M$100Mgrantee revenue →↑ your share of their budgetSCHOODIC INSTITUTE AT ACADIA NATIONAL PARK — $1,980,479 over 1y, 37% of budgetTHE NATURE CONSERVANCY — $1,592,000 over 2y, 0.1% of budgetDOWNEAST SALMON FEDERATION — $1,331,990 over 7y, 29% of budgetYORK LAND TRUST — $1,250,941 over 4y, 32% of budgetFrenchman Bay Conservancy — $783,294 over 4y, 17% of budgetTHE COMMUNITY SCHOOL OF MOUNT DESERT — $650,800 over 2y, 18% of budgetCoastal Mountains Land Trust — $592,680 over 5y, 11% of budgetBLUE HILL HERITAGE TRUST — $515,282 over 3y, 12% of budgetMidcoast Conservancy — $313,113 over 5y, 4.5% of budgetMaine Community Foundation Inc — $200,000 over 1y, 0.3% of budgetForest Society of Maine — $200,000 over 1y, 3.6% of budgetISLAND HOUSING TRUST — $160,000 over 2y, 18% of budgetMaine Farmland Trust — $154,650 over 2y, 1.5% of budgetCoastal Rivers Conservation Trust — $145,000 over 2y, 3.8% of budgetTHE KENNEBEC LAND TRUST — $140,660 over 1y, 15% of budgetFriends of Acadia — $137,772 over 1y, 3.0% of budgetCRABTREE NECK LAND TRUST — $125,000 over 1y, 41% of budgetNiweskok — $115,000 over 1y, 10% of budgetDOWNEAST COASTAL CONSERVANCY — $113,334 over 3y, 7.8% of budgetBrunswick-Topsham Land Trust Inc — $106,646 over 4y, 4.3% of budgetATLANTIC CHALLENGE FOUNDATION INC DBA THE APPRENTICESHOP — $80,000 over 1y, 12% of budgetROYAL RIVER CONSERVATION TRUST — $65,000 over 1y, 5.5% of budgetFRIENDS OF HOPE CEMETERY & WOODS — $50,000 over 1y, 6.2% of budgetWABANAKI CULTURAL PRESERVATION COALITION — $43,100 over 2y, 4.3% of budgetNORTHEAST WILDERNESS TRUST CORPORATION — $30,000 over 1y, 0.2% of budgetSOMES-MEYNELL WILDLIFE SANCTUARY — $25,000 over 1y, 5.9% of budgetGeorges River Land Trust — $24,750 over 2y, 1.3% of budgetNEW ENGLAND FORESTRY FOUNDATION INC — $15,000 over 1y, 0.3% of budgetNEW LEARNING JOURNEY INC — $10,000 over 1y, 0.5% of budgetLEGACY PHILANTHROPY WORKS — $10,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budget
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.

Maine Community Found…Davis Conservation Fo…The Nature ConservancyOnion FoundationQuimby Family Foundat…Elmina B Sewall Found…John Sage FoundationMomentum ConservationFields Pond Foundatio…Morton-Kelly Charitab…Edward C Johnson FundBafflin Foundation
Maine Community Foundation IncME62.1× affinity32 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Maine Community Foundation Inc · Davis Conservation Foundation · The Nature Conservancy · Onion Foundation · Quimby Family Foundation · Elmina B Sewall Foundation · John Sage Foundation · Momentum Conservation · Fields Pond Foundation Inc · Morton-Kelly Charitable Trust · Edward C Johnson Fund · Bafflin 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 organization Maine Coast Heritage Trust 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
’20’21’22’23’24’25
no gov · 10%6%25%56%100%your share of their income ↑0%25%50%75%100%share of the org’s income from government →median 88%
  • New England Forestry Foundation Inc — 88% of income from government
  • Northeast Wilderness Trust Corporation — 2% of income from government
no gov moneyreceives it· size = income
1get no government money at all
4report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)
1rely on government for over half their income
typical government reliance, FY20–25

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.

On method. Every financial figure here is read directly from IRS e-file XML — your own 990/990-PF and the multi-year returns of the 45 grantees we resolved across every year we hold, several hundred filings in all (a different count from the grant rows on the cover, which are one fiscal year)— each linked to its source. Grantee achievements and outcomes are each organization’s own program-service reporting (Form 990, Part III); we read these as association with sustained funding — the foundation is one of several forces — suppress low-confidence name matches rather than guess, and say so where a figure rests on a single grant or filing. Not everything on this page is a filed figure, and the difference matters. Filed is what you reported on your 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. How we build these →

Generated from your IRS Form 990 e-file return for fiscal year 2024, released 2024. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

Source object · view filing

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