How much does National Forest Foundation give?

National Forest Foundation reported 168 itemized grants totaling $17,362,537, out of $18,264,980 in total grant expense reported on the return in its FY2025 IRS filing. It funded between 95 and 124 organizations a year over FY2018 to FY2024.

What does National Forest Foundation fund?

By grant dollars over FY2017 to FY2025, its largest causes are Environment (96%), Recreation & Sports (2%), Public Safety & Disaster (1%).

Who are National Forest Foundation's largest grantees?

By total granted over FY2017 to FY2025: Conservation Legacy ($6.0M), The Wetlands Initiative ($4.5M), City of Greeley ($2.7M).

Does National Forest Foundation fund new organizations?

In FY2024, 35% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.

Which funders back the same organizations as National Forest Foundation?

Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include National Wilderness Stewardship Alliance, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Patagoniaorg.

Where is National Forest Foundation based?

National Forest Foundation is based in MT.

National Forest Foundation

National Forest Foundation at a glance Also receives grants: funding profile →

· Public charity

National Forest Foundation

The NATIONAL FOREST FOUNDATION (nff), chartered by congress, turns america's love of nature into meaningful action for 193-million acre national forest system through on the ground program work and grant making activities, and accepts and administers private gifts of funds and land for the benefit of the national forests.

$18M

Granted FY2025still arriving

168

Grants FY2025still arriving

States reached

$2.1M

Largest

01What it funds

01100% classified

What it funded, over time

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

Environment$57MRecreation & Sports$1.0MPublic Safety & Disaster$803kYouth Development$252kAnimals$197kHuman Services$103kCommunity Improvement$31k

02FY2025 · 168 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

How this is measured

The 168 grants below total $17,362,537, the rows itemized in this filing. The $18,264,980 headline is the total grant expense on the return; the other $902,443 is giving the schedule does not break out (grants under the $5,000 itemization floor, grants to individuals, grants on other schedules). Every figure below describes the itemized rows only.

By grant size · FY2025

Under $10k12 grants · $84k
$10k–50k80 grants · $2.3M
$50k–250k63 grants · $7.0M
$250k+13 grants · $8.1M

$40,711

Median grant

States reached

$96M

Total assets

Largest grants
Recipient	Amount
CITY OF GREELEY	$2,117,404
CONSERVATION LEGACY	$1,651,769
TRUCKEE RIVER WATERSHED COUNCIL	$654,937
INLAND EMPIRE RESOURCE CONSERVATION DISTRICT	$500,000
CALIFORNIA WILDLIFE FOUNDATION	$477,720
WILDLANDS RESTORATION VOLUNTEERS	$411,597
HISPANIC ACCESS FOUNDATION	$408,895
COUNTY OF LARIMER	$348,504
COLORADO FOURTEENERS INITIATIVE	$348,180
THE EMBER ALLIANCE	$305,000
BIG THOMPSON WATERSHED COALITION	$296,599
COALITION FOR THE POUDRE RIVER WATERSHED	$280,491
FRIENDS OF THE DILLON RANGER DISTRICT	$265,000
INTER-TRIBAL COUNCIL OF MICHIGAN INC	$241,806
COLORADO FIRECAMP INC	$223,545

02The need

Does the money reach high-need areas?

Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, against the area’s typical level.

show:

Its human-services grants (FY17–23, $240k) land where the poverty rate runs at 15%, against an area that typically sits at 10%. 100% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of its grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount

How this is measured

Matched: human-services grants are those whose grantee’s IRS cause code is Human Services. Placed by people below the poverty line in the grantee’s ZIP, averaged from the tracts in that ZIP.

Which US states its grants reach

How this is measured

US grants placed by each grantee’s ZIP, which can differ from where services are delivered. Need from public data (U.S. Census/ACS, CDC PLACES, Eviction Lab, USDA), shown as context about the area, never attributed to the funder’s giving.

03Its grantees

repeat funding

Who it funds again

Organizations funded in more than one year, against those funded once.

88%of every dollar goes to organizations it has funded before.

$68M · 215 repeat orgs$8.8M to everyone else

Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +67% since the first grant, against +34% for those funded once.

215 repeat relationships: 113 still active in FY2025, 102 since wound down; 55 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

215

112

Total granted

$68M

$5.1M

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+67%

+34%

Still filing today

87%

72%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2025, 79% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $3.7M went to new ones.

RenewedFirst-time

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

EnvironmentRecreation & SportsEducationYouth DevelopmentAnimalsCommunity ImprovementOther

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.

Backed again, and grew

CONSERVATION LEGACY
9× · 2017–2025 · $6.0M · revenue +161%
RM
ROCKY MOUNTAIN YOUTH CORPS
9× · 2017–2025 · $2.4M · revenue +135%
CF
COLORADO FOURTEENERS INITIATIVE
8× · 2017–2025 · $2.0M · revenue +73%

Funded once

AR
AGRICULTURAL RESEARCH SERVICE
one grant, 2017 · $890k
BS
Boise State University
one grant, 2023 · $346k
WR
West Region Wildfire Council
one grant, 2024 · $209k · revenue 0%

How this is measured

Repeat means funded in two or more distinct years. Growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.

04Its field

Closest unfunded matches

The nonprofits that most resemble its grantees but are not funded by it, scored along the direction from the rest of the field toward the portfolio. A resemblance in what they say they do, not a recommendation.

Falls Creek Wildlands and Trails

Falls Creek Wildlands and Trails FCWT promotes conservation stewardship and responsible recreation in the Falls Creek area through trail development and maintenance environmental restoration and preservation projects and educational…

Environment

Methow Valley Trails Collaborative

Enhancing sustainable trail experiences in the Methow Valley.

Environment

Cascadia Wildlands

Cascadia wildlands defends and restores cacasia's wild ecosystems in the forests,in the courts, and in the streets. we envision vast old-growth forests, rivers full of wild salmon, wolves howling in the backcountry, a stable climate, and…

Environment

Rocky Mountain Wild

Rocky mountain wild works to protect, connect, and restore wildlife and wild lands in the southern rocky mountain region. we work to secure the biodiversity of the mountains, plains, and desert ecosystems of colorado, wyoming, utah, and…

Environment

Santa Fe Forest Coalition

Educate the public on forest conservation issues in New Mexico

Environment

Stewards of the Sequoia

Promoting Responsible Recreation and Environmental Stewardship

Environment

The Jmt Wilderness Conservancy

Working to restore the watersheds, wilderness, and wildlife in the high sierra nevada following the john muir trail (est. 1915) for all life in california.

Environment

Blackfoot Challenge Inc

The mission of The Blackfoot Challenge is to coordinate efforts that will conserve and enhance the natural resources and rural way of life in the Blackfoot Watershed for present and future generations.

Environment

Central Sierra Environmental Resource Center Inc

CSERC protects water, wildlife, and wild places of the Northern Yosemite region.

Unclassified

CalWild

The California Wilderness Coalition protects the natural landscapes that make California unique, providing clean air and water, a home to wildlife, and a place for recreation and spiritual renewal.

—

Cowiche Canyon Conservancy

Protecting our shrub-steppe and connecting people to this vanishing landscape.

—

Wood River Land Trust Co

The wood river land trust's mission is to protect and sustain the treasured landscapes and life-giving waters of the wood river valley and to inspire love for this special place for generations to come.

Environment

How this is measured

The grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Mid Klamath Watershed Council; the most unlike its peers is Idaho Forest Restoration Partnership. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.

04the grantee network

316 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2026.

Each grant beside the grantee’s revenue from every source, year by year.

How this is measured

Counted here: distinct organizations funded across 2017 to 2026, not grant rows in a single year, so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 316 of the 384 grantees resolved in that span have returns of their own we could reconcile.

Each grantee is resolved to its own IRS returns. Association, dated; never a causal claim.

Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)

131

Early backer (in before they grew)

310/316

Grantees still filing

228/316

Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

Environment$32,130,057Other$19,492,271Youth Development$10,499,986Recreation & Sports$3,981,970Animals$2,512,474Education$2,059,549Employment$1,231,765

Showing the 200 largest grantees by grant value.

Each grantee by its size and the funder’s share of it; top left is load-bearing

Grantee by grantee: a decade per organization, before and after funding

A decade per grantee: revenue shaded, grants as bars, all rows on one timeline.

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.

National Wilderness Stewardship AllianceCO91.3× affinity43 shared granteesties to 10 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: National Wilderness Stewardship Alliance · National Fish and Wildlife Foundation · Patagoniaorg · Resources Legacy Fund · The Nature Conservancy · The Wilderness Society · American Trails · National Park Foundation · Wilburforce Foundation · Western Conservation Foundation · The Corps Network · Conservation Lands 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.

How much its grantees rely on government

Each dot is one organization National Forest Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from National Forest Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.

2024

’20’21’22’23’24’25

no gov moneyreceives it· size = income

1get no government money at all

35report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)

5rely on government for over half their income

typical government reliance, FY20–25

How this is measured

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 a grant caused the public funding. Coverage is precision-first, a floor rather than 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 to 24 months.

Play a game based on National Forest’s filings →

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