How much does Nels and Liz Leutwiler Foundation give?

Nels and Liz Leutwiler Foundation reported 49 grants totaling $14,300 in its FY2025 IRS filing. It funded between 17 and 49 organizations a year over FY2020 to FY2024.

What does Nels and Liz Leutwiler Foundation fund?

By grant dollars over FY2020 to FY2025, its largest causes are Environment (29%), Science & Tech (21%), Philanthropy (14%).

Who are Nels and Liz Leutwiler Foundation's largest grantees?

By total granted over FY2020 to FY2025: Union Church of Lake Bluff ($17k), Sierra Club Foundation ($11k), Northern Illinois Food Bank ($6k).

Does Nels and Liz Leutwiler Foundation fund new organizations?

In FY2024, 27% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.

Does Nels and Liz Leutwiler 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 Nels and Liz Leutwiler Foundation?

Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include Ge Aerospace Foundation, AbbVie Foundation, Ibm International Foundation.

Where is Nels and Liz Leutwiler Foundation based?

Nels and Liz Leutwiler Foundation is based in IL.

Nels and Liz Leutwiler Foundation

Nels and Liz Leutwiler Foundation at a glance

· Private foundation

Nels and Liz Leutwiler 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.

$14k

Granted FY2025still arriving

Grants FY2025still arriving

States reached

$1k

Largest

01What it funds

0197% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2020 to 2025.

Environment$54kScience & Tech$38kPhilanthropy$25kArts & Culture$24kReligion$19kFood & Nutrition$6kPublic Safety & Disaster$5kEducation$4kOther$0

02FY2025 · 49 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

$100

Median grant

States reached

$61k

Total assets

Largest grants
Recipient	Amount
NATIONAL PARKS CONSERVATION ASSOCIATION	$1,200
ENVIRONMENTAL DEFENSE FUND	$1,000
SIERRA CLUB FOUNDATION	$1,000
NRDC	$1,000
SECOND CITY CURLING FOUNDATION	$1,000
NATURE CONSERVANCY	$1,000
YOSEMITE CONSERVANCY	$1,000
FRIENDS OF THE EARTH	$1,000
LAKE BLUFF OPEN LANDS	$500
WILDERNESS SOCIETY	$500
WTTW11	$500
WOODS HOLE OCEANIC INSTITUTE	$240
NATIONAL CIVIL RIGHTS MUSEUM	$200
NORTHERN IL FOOD BANK	$200
FRIENDS OF THE LAKE BLUFF LIBRARY	$200

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 (FY23–23, $100) land where the poverty rate runs at 7%, against an area that typically sits at 9%. 0% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Its grants skew toward lower-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.

77%of every dollar goes to organizations it has funded before.

$138k · 62 repeat orgs$41k to everyone else

Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +21% since the first grant, against +3% for those funded once.

62 repeat relationships: 36 still active in FY2025, 26 since wound down; 12 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

Total granted

$138k

$38k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+21%

+3%

Still filing today

65%

54%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2025, 77% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $3k went to new ones.

RenewedFirst-time

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

EnvironmentArts & CultureEducationInternationalHealthRecreation & SportsOther

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

NI
NORTHERN ILLINOIS FOOD BANK
6× · 2020–2025 · $6k · revenue +8%
FO
FRIENDS OF THE EARTH
5× · 2021–2025 · $5k · revenue +16%
BELOIT COLLEGE
3× · 2021–2024 · $2k · revenue +33%

Funded once

LE
LCFPDPF ENDOWMENT FUND
one grant, 2020 · $25k
AN
American National Red Cross & Its Constituent Chapters and Branchesgraduated
one grant, 2020 · $5k · revenue +38%
AC
AMERICAN COMPUTER AND ROBOTICS MUSEUM
one grant, 2020 · $5k

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.

World Wildlife Fund Inc

Wwf's mission is to conserve nature and reduce the most pressing threats to the diversity of life on earth. (continued on schedule o)

Environment

Conservation International Foundation

Ci works to spotlight and secure the critical benefits that nature provides to humanity.

Environment

Natural Resources Defense Council Inc

We safeguard the earth: its people, its plants and animals, and (see schedule o) the natural systems on which all life depends. we work to restore the integrity of the elements that sustain life - air, land, and water - to defend…

Environment

Institute for Journalism & Natural Resources

The organization pursues higher standards of news coverage of natural resources and the environment -- standards of accuracy, fairness, balance, depth and context.

Arts & Culture

Rainforest Trust

Rainforest trust saves endangered wildlife and protects our planet by creating rainforest reserves through partnerships, community engagement, and donor support.

International

Climate Conservation Dba Center for Large Landscape Conservation

We bring science, policy, and proven solutions directly to communities working to restore the integrity and natural connectivity of the landscapes in which they live. (see schedule o)

Environment

Property and Environment Research Center

Perc is dedicated to advancing conservation through markets, incentives, property rights, and partnerships.

Public Benefit

National Audubon Society Inc

We work towards a future where birds thrive across the americas because audubon is a powerful, diverse, and ever-growing force for conservation. (continued on schedule o).

Environment

The Wildlife Society

The wildlife society's mission is to inspire, empower, and enable wildlife professionals to sustain wildlife populations and habitats through science-based management and conservation.

Animals

Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation

This member-supported organization protects and restores iowa's land, water and wildlife for future generations. priorities include permanent land protection, promotion of improved land management and bringing new conservation…

Environment

Washington Forest Law Center

Dedicated to protecting the world's natural environment on behalf of the public by serving as a public interest law firm. refer to schedule o, part iii, line 4a, for list of litigated cases or advocacy work.

—

Climate Institute

The climate institute is organized for the purpose of educating the general public and policy makers as to the gravity of potential climate change, exploring the policy implications of the latest scientific findings on climate modelling…

Environment

How this is measured

The grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Glacier National Park Conservancy; the most unlike its peers is Beef 4 Hunger. 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

60 grantees tracked through their own filings, 2017–2025.

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 2025, not grant rows in a single year, so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 60 of the 101 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)

Early backer (in before they grew)

60/60

Grantees still filing

36/60

Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

Other$137,380Environment$27,166Food & Nutrition$6,400Human Services$5,100Education$3,295Arts & Culture$2,525Recreation & Sports$1,100

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.

Ge Aerospace FoundationCT19.6× affinity11 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Ge Aerospace Foundation · AbbVie Foundation · Ibm International Foundation · The Pfizer Foundation Inc · Lee Family Foundation · Fulk Family Foundation Inc · Natural Resources Defense Council Inc · The Chicago Community Trust · Shell USA Company Foundation · John D and Catherine T Macarthur Foundation · Texas Instruments Foundation · Jpmorgan Chase 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 Nels and Liz Leutwiler Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from Nels and Liz Leutwiler Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.

2024

’20’21’22’23’24’25

no gov moneyreceives it· size = income

3get no government money at all

9report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)

0rely 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.

05Through Plinth

Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

How do I get to Nels and Liz Leutwiler Foundation?

Find your warmest path to Nels and Liz Leutwiler 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.

Play a game based on Nels and Liz Leutwiler’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