· Private foundation
Meyer and Raena Hammerman Foundation
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.
What you funded, over time
Every grant clustered by its grantee’s IRS cause code (NTEE), by year — across FY2020–2025.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| FOUNDATION FIGHTING BLINDNESS | $3,834 |
| ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO | $3,000 |
| PLANNED PARENTHOOD OF ILLINOIS | $3,000 |
| PENNY POSSIBLE FOUNDATION | $2,833 |
| NORTHERN ILLINOIS FOOD BANK | $2,166 |
| GREATER CHICAGO FOOD DEPOSITORY | $1,689 |
| AMERICARES | $1,667 |
| HARVARD CLUB OF CHICAGO | $1,500 |
| CHICAGO SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA | $1,000 |
| PROJECT ON GOVERNMENT OVERSIGHT | $1,000 |
| INSTITUTE FOR THE STUDY OF ANCIENT CULTURES | $1,000 |
| HEARING HEALTH FOUNDATION | $1,000 |
| WORLD CENTRAL KITCHEN | $1,000 |
| HIAS | $1,000 |
| CONSERVATION FUND | $1,000 |
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 (FY20–25, $14k) land where the poverty rate runs at 14%, against an area that typically sits at 10%. 76% 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 +20% since the first grant, against 0% for the ones you funded once.
128 repeat relationships — 107 still active in FY2025, 21 since wound down; 9 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (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 FY2025, 94% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $4k 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
- PPPlanned Parenthood of Illinois6× · 2020–2025 · $10k · revenue +77%
- JUJEWISH UNITED FUND OF METROPOLITAN CHICAGO2× · 2020–2021 · $8k · revenue +13%
THE FOUNDATION FIGHTING BLINDNESS INC3× · 2023–2025 · $7k · revenue +20%
Funded once
PLANNED PARENTHOOD OF GREATER TEXAS INCone grant, 2021 · $7k · revenue -24%- HCHARVARD CLUB OF CHICAGOone grant, 2024 · $2k · revenue -8%
- LOLyric Opera of Chicagograduatedone grant, 2024 · $1k · revenue +42%
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.
Provide an independent forum for those who dare to read, think, speak, and write to advance the professional, literary, and scientific understanding of sea power and other issues critical to global security.
Advance science, engineering, and innovation throughout the world for the benefit of all. the world's largest multidisciplinary scientific society and a leading publisher of cutting-edge research through its science family of journals,…
See schedule onorc at the university of chicago conducts research and data science on critical societal issues to guide decision-making and the development of programs and public policy. our experts identify relationships and trends, and…
American gas association's (the association) mission is to develop and advocate for informed, innovative, and durable policy that fulfills our nation's energy needs, environmental aspirations and economic potential. we are committed to…
The npr foundation ("foundation") is organized and operated exclusively for the benefit of its sole supported organization, national public radio, inc. ("npr inc."). the foundation supports npr inc. through various activities such as…
To promote public health, safety, and welfare through the improvement of the quality and quantity of drinking water and the development and furtherance of understanding of the problems relating thereto.
National public radio, inc. ("npr") works collaboratively with member public radio station licensees ("member stations") to create a more informed public, one that is challenged and invigorated by a deeper understanding and appreciation of…
Agu's mission is to advance and support an inclusive community of earth and space scientists and partners dedicated to discovery and solutions to societal challenges. agu seeks to catalyze discovery and solutions to scientific and societal…
The bac is committed to provide excellence in design education grounded in practice and accessible to diverse communities.
Central indiana corporate partnership (cicp) is an alliance of indiana's business and research university leaders coming together to foster long-term prosperity for the region. cicp's mission is to transform the economy of indiana in order…
To establish and promote programs to protect the global climate, forests, wildlife and the natural environment, through research, advocacy, and investigation.
Empowering financial professionals and consumers through world-class advocacy and education.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is National Center for Learning Disabilities Inc and the most unlike its peers is Internet Archive. 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 44 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) — 2% of your grantees by number, and just 1% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 0.0% 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.
128 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. 128 of the 165 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 Planned Parenthood of Illinois ↗
- Who funds JEWISH UNITED FUND OF METROPOLITAN CHICAGO ↗
- Who funds THE FOUNDATION FIGHTING BLINDNESS INC ↗
- Who funds THE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO ↗
- Who funds PLANNED PARENTHOOD OF GREATER TEXAS INC ↗
- Who funds AMERICARES FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds GREATER CHICAGO FOOD DEPOSITORY ↗
- Who funds BUILD INC ↗
- Who funds THE WETLANDS INITIATIVE ↗
- Who funds PUPPIES BEHIND BARS INC ↗
- Who funds HEARING HEALTH FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds GIFFORDS LAW CENTER TO PREVENT GUN VIOLENCE ↗
- Who funds PAWS CHICAGO ↗
- Who funds UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds ST JUDE CHILDREN'S RESEARCH HOSPITAL INC ↗
- Who funds ALLIANCE FOR THE GREAT LAKES ↗
- Who funds OCEAN CONSERVANCY ↗
- Who funds PROJECT ON GOVERNMENT OVERSIGHT INC ↗
- Who funds THE CONSERVATION FUND A NONPROFIT CORPORATION ↗
- Who funds WATERKEEPER ALLIANCE INC ↗
- Who funds Feeding America ↗
- Who funds NORTHERN ILLINOIS FOOD BANK ↗
- Who funds JUST DETENTION INTERNATIONAL ↗
- Who funds FIELD MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY ↗
- Who funds WORLD CENTRAL KITCHEN INC ↗
- Who funds HIAS INC ↗
- Who funds THE INTREPID FALLEN HEROES FUND ↗
- Who funds CHICAGO COALITION TO END HOMELESSNESS ↗
- Who funds DEATH WITH DIGNITY NATIONAL CENTER ↗
- Who funds FINCA INTERNATIONAL INC ↗
- Who funds THE REPORTERS COMMITTEE FOR FREEDOM OF THE PRESS ↗
- Who funds ENVIRONMENTAL LAW AND POLICY CENTER OF THE MIDWEST ↗
- Who funds THE BLUE CARD INC ↗
- Who funds Chicago Symphony Orchestra ↗
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 Chicago Community Trust · John D and Catherine T Macarthur Foundation · Ncrc Community Development Fund Inc · Tawani Charitable Distribution Fund · Gaylord and Dorothy Donnelley Foundation · AbbVie Foundation · The Andrew W Mellon Foundation · Metzner Family Foundation · Lloyd a Fry Foundation · Field Foundation of Illinois · Polk Bros Foundation Inc · Jpmorgan Chase 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 Meyer and Raena Hammerman 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.
- Hias Inc — 88% of income from government
- Xerces Society Inc — 22% of income from government
- St John's College — 2% of income from government
- Americares Foundation Inc — 0% of income from government
- K9S for Warriors 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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How do I get to Meyer and Raena Hammerman Foundation?
Find your warmest path to Meyer and Raena Hammerman 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.