Colorado · Private foundation
Merle Chambers Fund
Its FY2025 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.
- $50M
- Granted FY2024(still arriving)
- 193
- Grants FY2024
- 80
- Organizations funded FY2023
- 14%
- First-time grantees FY2023
Read this first · the figures below need context
100% of Merle Chambers Fund’s FY2025 grant dollars went to The Denver Foundation, not to grantees.
Its money now reaches organizations through that sponsor, which does not report who recommended each grant. FY2025 names 0 organizations directly, so a portfolio cannot be read from it. Everything below is therefore FY2024, the last year Merle Chambers Fund named its own grantees at scale: 86 organizations, $50M. It is dated, not current.
Organizations named directly on the return
Amber years are those where most dollars went to a sponsor.
- Median grant, FY2024
- $50,000
- Largest grant, FY2024
- $28,459,047
- Organizations funded a year
- 31 to 108
- FY2019 to FY2023
- States reached, FY2024
- 17
- Applications
- Preselected organizations only
- Per its most recent filing; check its own site
How open it is to new grantees
In FY2023, 14% of the organizations Merle Chambers Fund funded were first-time grantees, receiving 6% of its grant dollars.
New vs renewed · share of each year
In FY2023, 94% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $449k went to new ones.
Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant
How this is measured
The numbers by year
| Fiscal year | Organizations funded | To those organizations | First-time grantees |
|---|---|---|---|
| FY2024still arriving | 102 | $44M | 18% |
| FY2023 | 80 | $6.9M | 14% |
| FY2022 | 108 | $7.4M | 40% |
| FY2021 | 67 | $4.1M | 49% |
| FY2020 | 63 | $2.9M | 71% |
| FY2019 | 31 | $1.1M | n/a |
What it funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2019 to 2025.
Where its grants go
Grant dollars by states, across the years we hold.
Which US states its grants reach
Top grantees
Largest recipients by total granted, FY2019 to FY2024, and the share of each one’s budget the grants supplied at peak.
| Grantee | Total granted | Years | Share of their budget |
|---|---|---|---|
| Denver Art Museum | $33,135,647 | 5 | 76% |
| State Leadership Project | $2,500,000 | 3 | 11% |
| The Bell Policy Center | $2,228,480 | 6 | 62% |
| State Voices | $1,455,000 | 5 | 2% |
| Voter Registration Project | $1,400,000 | 4 | 2% |
| Center for Technology and Civic Life | $1,350,000 | 5 | 7% |
| Alliance for Youth Organizing | $950,000 | 3 | 5% |
| Cobalt Foundation | $935,180 | 6 | 8% |
| Political Research Associates Inc | $930,060 | 6 | 14% |
| Rocky Mountain Planned Parenthood Inc | $810,350 | 5 | 1% |
Show all 145 grantees
What it could do for these grantees
Plus 36 recipients with no EIN on record ($4.6M), not named here.
Where it is load-bearing
Merle Chambers Fund supplied at least a quarter of the budget for 6 of its grantees at some point. The chart plots its 140 largest grantees; load-bearing ones sit top left.
Tap a dot to name the grantee.
How this is measured
Co-funders
Grantmakers whose grantees overlap with this funder’s far more than size alone predicts. Closer means stronger alignment; arcs show where they also fund each other. Here they form a tightly interlocked group: most of these funders back each other's grantees too.
Open a dossier: Rose Community Foundation · The Colorado Health Foundation · The Denver Foundation · Colorado Gives Foundation · Community Foundation Boulder County · Hopewell Fund · New Venture Fund · The Colorado Trust · Brett Family Foundation · The Women's Foundation of Colorado Inc · Caring for Colorado Foundation · Boettcher Foundation
How this is measured
Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus
How do I get to Merle Chambers Fund?
Find your warmest path to Merle Chambers Fund 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.
About Merle Chambers Fund
- How much does Merle Chambers Fund give?
- Merle Chambers Fund reported 193 grants totaling $50,131,139 in its FY2024 IRS filing. It funded between 31 and 108 organizations a year over FY2019 to FY2023.
- What does Merle Chambers Fund fund?
- By grant dollars over FY2019 to FY2024, its largest causes are Arts & Culture (45%), Public Benefit (17%), Philanthropy (16%).
- Who are Merle Chambers Fund's largest grantees?
- By total granted over FY2019 to FY2024: Denver Art Museum ($33M), State Leadership Project ($2.5M), The Bell Policy Center ($2.2M).
- Does Merle Chambers Fund fund new organizations?
- In FY2023, 14% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.
- Does Merle Chambers Fund accept unsolicited applications?
- Its most recent filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and does not take unsolicited requests. Check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.
- Which funders back the same organizations as Merle Chambers Fund?
- Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include Rose Community Foundation, The Colorado Health Foundation, The Denver Foundation.
- Where is Merle Chambers Fund based?
- Merle Chambers Fund is based in CO.
Play a game based on Merle Chambers’ filings →