Does Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family Foundation 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.

Foundation Dossiers

Ohio · Private foundation

Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family 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.

$575k
Granted FY2025(still arriving): 41
Grants FY2025: 33
Organizations funded FY2024: 21%
First-time grantees FY2024

Read the full brief

Median grant, FY2025: $3,600
Largest grant, FY2025: $250,000
Organizations funded a year: 9 to 33; FY2018 to FY2024
States reached, FY2025: 9
Total assets, FY2025: $2.7M
Applications: Preselected organizations only; Per its most recent filing; check its own site

How open it is to new grantees

In FY2024, 21% of the organizations Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family Foundation funded were first-time grantees, receiving 23% of its grant dollars.

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2024, 77% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $69k went to new ones.

RenewedFirst-time

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

Arts & CultureEducationInternationalHealthReligionSocial ScienceOther

How this is measured

First-time means a grantee’s first year in the filing window; renewed means funded in an earlier year too. The renewed share climbs naturally as a portfolio matures, so the signal is a year that bucks it (a wave of new grantees). The earliest year is left-censored: relationships that predate the data read as new. Theme is the grantee’s IRS cause.

The numbers by year

Fiscal year	Organizations funded	To those organizations	First-time grantees
FY2025still arriving	36	$313k	31%
FY2024	33	$299k	21%
FY2023	28	$209k	43%
FY2022	21	$242k	57%
FY2021	23	$364k	70%
FY2020	12	$278k	58%
FY2019	10	$194k	20%
FY2018	9	$113k	44%

100% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2017 to 2025.

Philanthropy$1.2MArts & Culture$984kEducation$406kHuman Services$302kCommunity Improvement$135kReligion$68kHealth$65kYouth Development$60kOther$0

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, FY2017 to FY2025, and the share of each one’s budget the grants supplied at peak.

Grantee	Total granted	Years	Share of their budget
Edlavitch Jewish Community Center of Washington DC Inc	$282,800	6	1%
National Archives Foundation	$213,019	8	1%
John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts	$188,389	7	0%
Sidwell Friends School	$154,000	3	n/a
Federal City Council	$115,000	4	1%
National Symphony Orch Assn of Washington DC	$94,096	2	16%
Kenyon College	$75,000	4	0%
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum	$72,188	5	0%
Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum	$50,000	2	0%
Lillian and Albert Small Capital Jewish Museum	$44,414	3	1%

Show all 72 grantees

All grantees of Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family Foundation by total granted
Grantee	Total granted	Years	Share of their budget
Edlavitch Jewish Community Center of Washington DC Inc	$282,800	6	1%
National Archives Foundation	$213,019	8	1%
John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts	$188,389	7	0%
Sidwell Friends School	$154,000	3	n/a
Federal City Council	$115,000	4	1%
National Symphony Orch Assn of Washington DC	$94,096	2	16%
Kenyon College	$75,000	4	0%
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum	$72,188	5	0%
Dallas Holocaust and Human Rights Museum	$50,000	2	0%
Lillian and Albert Small Capital Jewish Museum	$44,414	3	1%
The George Washington University	$31,000	6	0%
Martha's Table Inc	$30,700	8	0%
Junior Achievement of Greater Washington	$30,000	1	1%
Medstar Health Inc	$30,000	5	0%
The Washington Ballet	$20,720	4	0%
City Kids to Wilderness Project Inc	$20,000	4	0%
Independence Initiative Inc	$20,000	1	n/a
Jewbelong Inc	$20,000	2	0%
Ohr Kodesh Congregation	$18,000	2	n/a
The Washington Housing Conservancy Inc	$17,500	4	0%
The Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage	$15,000	1	1%
The Uli Foundation	$11,000	2	0%
The James Beard Foundation Inc	$11,000	3	0%
Sibley Memorial Hospital Foundation	$10,000	1	0%
The Miriam Weiner Routes to Roots Foundation Inc	$10,000	1	24%
At the Well Project Inc	$10,000	4	0%
Brooklyn Community Housing and Services	$10,000	1	0%
Mary's Center for Maternal and Child Care Inc	$10,000	3	0%
Chabad of Rockville Inc	$10,000	1	n/a
Human Rights Campaign Foundation	$8,800	1	0%
The Seed Foundation	$7,500	5	0%
Washington University	$7,500	3	0%
N Street Village Inc	$7,500	3	0%
Save a Child's Heart Foundation US Inc	$7,200	3	0%
Yeshiva of Greater Washington Inc	$7,200	4	0%
Washington Performing Arts Society	$6,435	1	n/a
Edens Community Enrichment Foundation	$5,600	2	2%
William Wendt Center for Loss and Healing	$5,500	4	0%
Seeds of Peace Inc	$5,400	3	0%
Yad Yehuda of Greater Washington Inc	$5,400	3	n/a
International Women's Media Foundation	$5,000	1	0%
Washington Adventist Hospital Foundation Inc	$5,000	1	1%
Israel Policy Forum Inc	$5,000	1	0%
Hillel the Foundation for Jewish Campus Life	$5,000	1	0%
City Kids Inc	$5,000	1	n/a
Park Synagogue	$5,000	1	n/a
The Ciesla Foundation	$5,000	1	1%
Brooklyn Public Library	$5,000	1	0%
The National Museum of Women in the Arts	$5,000	1	0%
DC Policy Center	$5,000	1	n/a
Weitzman National Museum of American Jewish History	$4,700	1	n/a
Wolf Trap Foundation for the Performing Arts	$4,000	1	0%
St Jude Children's Research Hospital Inc	$3,600	1	0%
Maret School Inc	$3,600	1	0%
St Baldrick's Foundation Inc	$3,500	1	0%
Bethesda-Chevy Chase Rescue Squad Inc	$3,000	3	0%
Jubilee Housing Inc	$3,000	1	0%
The Urban Land Institute	$2,660	1	0%
Or David Outreach	$2,500	1	n/a
Alzheimer's Drug Discovery Foundation	$2,500	1	0%
Amer Assn Jewish Lawyers Jurists-Aajlj	$2,315	1	3%
The Tikvah Fund	$2,000	1	0%
Center for Creative Change	$1,800	1	0%
Colgate University	$1,800	1	0%
The Foundation of the City College of San Francisco	$1,666	1	0%
The Musical Arts Association	$1,367	1	0%
New Orleans Musicians Assistance Foundation	$1,000	1	0%
Trust for the National Mall	$1,000	1	0%
All Faiths Food Bank Inc	$1,000	1	n/a
Crafting Africas Future Inc	$625	1	n/a
Gmiluth Chasodim (The Hebrew Free Loan Association)	$500	1	0%
Greater Cleveland Food Bank Inc	$500	1	0%

What it could do for these grantees

Plus 12 recipients with no EIN on record ($348k), not named here.

Each grantee by its size and the share of its budget Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family Foundation supplied at peak.

Tap a dot to name the grantee.

How this is measured

Share of budget is the funder’s grant in a year over the grantee’s total revenue that year, at its highest across the years we hold; revenue is from all sources. Only grantees confirmed against their own filings, whose grants do not exceed their revenue, are plotted: the largest 59.

Nonprofits that may fit its grantmaking

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.

Greater Washington Community FoundationDC30.5× affinity15 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Greater Washington Community Foundation · The Morris and Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation · The Jewish Federation of Greater Washington Inc · Galena-Yorktown Foundation · Clark Charitable Foundation Inc Dba a James & Alice B Clark Foundation · Clark-Winchcole Foundation · The Julius and Dorothy Lazarus Foundation Inc · The Nussdorf Family Foundation Inc · James and Susan Ratner Family Foundation · S Kann Sons Foundation Inc · Duber Family Foundation · Leo M Bernstein Family Foundation

How this is measured

Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. Overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.

Compare Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family Foundation with peer funders

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How do I get to Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family Foundation?

Find your warmest path to Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family 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.

About Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family Foundation

How much does Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family Foundation give?: Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family Foundation reported 41 grants totaling $575,291 in its FY2025 IRS filing. It funded between 9 and 33 organizations a year over FY2018 to FY2024.
What does Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family Foundation fund?: By grant dollars over FY2017 to FY2025, its largest causes are Philanthropy (36%), Arts & Culture (29%), Education (12%).
Who are Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family Foundation's largest grantees?: By total granted over FY2017 to FY2025: Edlavitch Jewish Community Center of Washington DC Inc ($283k), National Archives Foundation ($213k), John F Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts ($188k).
Does Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family Foundation fund new organizations?: In FY2024, 21% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.
Does Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family Foundation 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 Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family Foundation?: Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include Greater Washington Community Foundation, The Morris and Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation, The Jewish Federation of Greater Washington Inc.
Where is Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family Foundation based?: Michael and Deborah Ratner Salzberg Family Foundation is based in OH.