· Private foundation
Nancy Webb Ruskin 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 placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2017–2025.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2025
- Under $10k19 grants · $54k
- $10k–50k2 grants · $28k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| SAN FRANCISCO ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY | $15,500 |
| KQED | $12,000 |
| MONTEREY BAY AQUARIUM | $8,000 |
| ALAMEDA COUNTY FOOD BANK | $6,000 |
| ST JUDE'S CHILDRENS HOSP | $6,000 |
| NATIONAL PARK FOUNDATION | $5,000 |
| DOCTOR'S WITHOUT BORDERS | $3,000 |
| Individual grant recipient | $3,000 |
| SPECIAL OLYMPICS | $3,000 |
| ABODE SERVICES | $2,500 |
| MEALS ON WHEELS ALAMEDA COUNTY | $2,000 |
| SAVE THE CHILDREN | $2,000 |
| HABITAT FOR HUMANITY | $2,000 |
| CA STATE PARKS FOUDATION | $2,000 |
| CENTRAL CA FOOD BANK | $2,000 |
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.
Dollar for dollar, your grants (FY17–25) land where the poverty rate runs at 12%, against an area that typically sits at 9%. 96% of your 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 +52% since the first grant, against +46% for the ones you funded once.
30 repeat relationships — 18 still active in FY2025, 12 since wound down; 3 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, 96% 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
MONTEREY BAY AQUARIUM FOUNDATION9× · 2017–2025 · $70k · revenue +105%
ALAMEDA COUNTY COMMUNITY FOOD BANK9× · 2017–2025 · $32k · revenue +87%- NPNATIONAL PARK FOUNDATION9× · 2017–2025 · $30k · revenue +244%
Funded once
- TATHE AMERICAN SOCIETY FOR THE PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALSone grant, 2022 · $2k · revenue +19%
- HWHumane World for Animals Incgraduatedone grant, 2017 · $1k · revenue +46%
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.
To ensure every companion animal has access to quality medical care, compassionate shelter, and a loving home.
See schedule osfmoma believes the art of our time is vital and shares it with passion and purpose, and that art and the creative process can open minds and help build a better world. for that reason, we assemble unparalleled collections,…
World animal protection is a global organization working to end factory farming and wildlife exploitation. we expose cruel systems, promote animal-friendly alternatives, and influence policy change. for over 75 years, we've been rewriting…
Founded in 1877, american humane association, dba american humane society (american humane) is committed to ensuring the safety, welfare and well-being of animals. our leadership programs are first to serve in promoting and nurturing the…
Nurture empathy and connection by engaging communities with socially relevant contemporary art
Through management of oakland zoo, the conservation society of california deepens connection with animals, saves wildlife, and inspires champions for the natural world.
The museum's mission statement is: "to discover, interpret, and disseminate - through scientific research and education - knowledge about human cultures, the natural world, and the universe."
The museum's mission is to inspire all californians to create a more vibrant future for themselves and their communities. through collections, exhibitions, education programs, and public dialogue, we inspire people of all ages and…
Wwf's mission is to conserve nature and reduce the most pressing threats to the diversity of life on earth. (continued on schedule o)
Inspiring communities to save wildlife for future generations.
The wildlife conservation society (wcs) saves wildlife and wild places worldwide through science, conservation action, education, and inspiring people to value nature.
Sweet farm is the world's first nonprofit sanctuary to address the devastating impact that factory farming has on climate change from the perspective of animals, plants, and the planet. we must first understand how these pieces are…
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is San Francisco Zoological Society and the most unlike its peers is Humanities West. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
Your grantees are a median of 48 years old; the field is 14. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 24% startups (under 5 years old) — 9% of your grantees by number, and just 1% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 0.0% lost their exemption, against 14% 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.
22 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. 22 of the 35 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 SAN FRANCISCO ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY ↗
- Who funds KQED INC ↗
- Who funds MONTEREY BAY AQUARIUM FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds ALAMEDA COUNTY COMMUNITY FOOD BANK ↗
- Who funds NATIONAL PARK FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds MEDECINS SANS FRONTIERES USA INC ↗
- Who funds Save The Children Federation Inc ↗
- Who funds ACCESS MAMMOTH ↗
- Who funds MEALS ON WHEELS OF ALAMEDA COUNTY ↗
- Who funds HUMANITIES WEST ↗
- Who funds EAST BAY SPCA ↗
- Who funds ABODE SERVICES ↗
- Who funds SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION ↗
- Who funds CHABOT SPACE & SCIENCE CENTER FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC SOCIETY ↗
- Who funds HUMANE SOCIETY SILICON VALLEY ↗
- Who funds CRAZY HORSE MEMORIAL FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds STEPHEN SILLER TUNNEL TO TOWERS FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds CENTRAL CALIFORNIA FOOD BANK ↗
- Who funds THE AMERICAN SOCIETY FOR THE PREVENTION OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS ↗
- Who funds Humane World for Animals Inc ↗
- Who funds OLIVE HYDE ART GUILD 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 Intuit Foundation · East Bay Community Foundation · The Blackbaud Giving Fund · The Pfizer Foundation Inc · The Bank of America Charitable Foundation Inc · National Philanthropic Trust · American Endowment Foundation · Morgan Stanley Global Impact Funding Trust Inc · Vanguard Charitable Endowment Program · Network for Good · American Online Giving Foundation Inc · Donor Advised Charitable Giving 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 Nancy Webb Ruskin 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.
- Save the Children Federation Inc — 30% 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.