Skip to content
O'Brien Foundation at a glance

· Private foundation

O'Brien Foundation

Its FY2025 filing reports that it accepted unsolicited grant applications.

$26k
Granted FY2025still arriving
14
Grants FY2025still arriving
1
States reached
$4k
Largest
01What it fundsRead
02The needRead
03Its granteesRead
04Its fieldRead
01What it funds
0185% classified

What it funded, over time

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

Religion$89kHealth$34kEducation$17kFood & Nutrition$13kPhilanthropy$12kHuman Services$9kArts & Culture$6kPublic Safety & Disaster$2kOther$0
02FY2025 · 14 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

$1,625
Median grant
1
States reached
$524k
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
OUR LADY OF VICTORY CATHEDRAL$4,000
Individual grant recipient$2,500
Individual grant recipient$2,500
Individual grant recipient$2,500
OUR LADY OF REFUGE CHURCH$2,000
REFUGIO ISD EDUCATION FOUNDATION$2,000
GOOD SAMARITAN MINISTRIES$1,625
GOLIAD COUNTY OUTREACH$1,625
DRISCOLL CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL$1,500
HOSPICE OF SOUTH TEXAS$1,500
HALO FLIGHT$1,000
SOUTH TEXAS CHILDREN'S HOME$1,000
IMMACULATE CONCEPTION CHURCH$1,000
RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES$1,000
02The need
03

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:

Dollar for dollar, its grants (FY17–25) land where the poverty rate runs at 18%, against an area that typically sits at 17%. 61% of its dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of its grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

area typical 17%BERCLAIR FIRE DEPARTMENT: $3k → 15%OUR LADY OF VICTORY CATHEDRAL: $4k → 16%ST CECILIA CATHOLIC SCHOOL: $2k → 16%RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES: $2k → 17%OUR LADY OF REFUGE CHURCH: $4k → 18%BEEVILLE FIRE DEPARTMENT: $3k → 29%BERCLAIR FIRE DEPARTMENT: $2k → 15%OUR LADY OF VICTORY CATHEDRAL: $4k → 16%ST CECILIA CATHOLIC SCHOOL: $2k → 16%OUR LADY OF REFUGE CHURCH: $4k → 18%BEEVILLE FIRE DEPARTMENT: $3k → 29%IMMACULATE CONCEPTION CHURCH: $3k → 15%OUR LADY OF VICTORY CATHEDRAL: $4k → 16%ST CECILIA CATHOLIC SCHOOL: $2k → 16%RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES: $2k → 17%OUR LADY OF REFUGE CHURCH: $4k → 18%BEEVILLE FIRE DEPARTMENT: $2k → 29%GOLIAD COUNTY OUTREACH: $2k → 15%OUR LADY OF VICTORY CATHEDRAL: $4k → 16%ST CECILIA CATHOLIC SCHOOL: $2k → 16%OUR LADY OF REFUGE CHURCH: $4k → 18%BEEVILLE FIRE DEPARTMENT: $2k → 29%IMMACULATE CONCEPTION CHURCH: $2k → 15%OUR LADY OF VICTORY CATHEDRAL: $4k → 16%RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES: $2k → 17%OUR LADY OF REFUGE CHURCH: $4k → 18%BEEVILLE FIRE DEPARTMENT: $2k → 29%IMMACULATE CONCEPTION CHURCH: $2k → 15%OUR LADY OF VICTORY CATHEDRAL: $4k → 16%OUR LADY OF REFUGE CHURCH: $4k → 18%BEEVILLE FIRE DEPARTMENT: $2k → 29%IMMACULATE CONCEPTION CHURCH: $2k → 15%OUR LADY OF VICTORY CATHEDRAL: $4k → 16%OUR LADY OF REFUGE CHURCH: $4k → 18%BEEVILLE FIRE DEPARTMENT: $2k → 29%OUR LADY OF VICTORY CATHEDRAL: $4k → 16%OUR LADY OF REFUGE CHURCH: $4k → 18%OUR LADY OF VICTORY CATHEDRAL: $4k → 16%REFUGIO FIRE DEPARTMENT: $3k → 18%HOSPICE OF SOUTH TEXAS: $2k → 16%REFUGIO FIRE DEPARTMENT: $3k → 18%HOSPICE OF SOUTH TEXAS: $2k → 16%REFUGIO FIRE DEPARTMENT: $2k → 18%HOSPICE OF SOUTH TEXAS: $2k → 16%OUR LADY OF REFUGE CHURCH: $2k → 18%REFUGIO ISD EDUCATION FOUNDATION: $2k → 18%REFUGIO FIRE DEPARTMENT: $2k → 18%GOOD SAMARITAN MINISTRIES: $2k → 18%0%20%40%50%more need →
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.
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.
04

Where the work is directed

The same grants placed two ways: where each recipient sits, and where its stated purpose sends the money.

About 24% of O'Brien Foundation’s grant dollars are earmarked for a different county than the recipient’s own address.

O'Brien Foundationlessmore of its giving
Placed by recipient address
How this is measured
Recipient view: each grant at its grantee’s ZIP, mapped to a county. Directed view: each grant at the county its stated purpose names, falling back to the recipient’s county when the purpose names no place; US grants only. A county shows only if it carries the top 95% of that view’s dollars. Purposes are read from the funder’s own 990 grant descriptions.
03Its grantees
repeat funding

Who it funds again

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

99%of every dollar goes to organizations it has funded before.
$219k · 19 repeat orgs$2k to everyone else

Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +55% since the first grant, against 0% for those funded once.

19 repeat relationships: 13 still active in FY2025, 6 since wound down; 1 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

19
1

Total granted

$219k
$2k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+55%
0%

Still filing today

32%
0%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2025, 94% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $2k went to new ones.

50%100%’17’18’19’20’21’22’23’24’25
RenewedFirst-time

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

’17’18’19’20’21’22’23’24’25
PhilanthropyHealthEducationOther
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

  • HO
    HOSPICE OF SOUTH TEXAS INC
    9× · 2017–2025 · $14k · revenue +28%
  • RM
    RONALD McDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES OF GREATER NORTH TEXAS INC
    9× · 2017–2025 · $12k · revenue +17%
  • DC
    Driscoll Children's Hospital
    9× · 2017–2025 · $11k · revenue +178%

Funded once

  • GC
    GOLIAD COUNTY OUTREACH FOOD PANTRY
    one grant, 2025 · $2k
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
05the grantee network

7 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. 7 of the 20 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.

0
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
1
Early backer (in before they grew)
6/7
Grantees still filing
5/7
Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

OUR LADY OF VICTORY CATHEDRAL: $36,000 · OtherOUR LADY OF VICTORY CATHEDRALOUR LADY OF REFUGE CHURCH: $34,000 · OtherOUR LADY OF REFUGE CHURCHIndividual grant recipient: $16,850 · OtherIndividual grant recipientIndividual grant recipient: $16,850 · OtherIndividual grant recipientIMMACULATE CONCEPTION CHURCH: $14,500 · OtherIMMACULATE CONCEPTION CHURCHHOSPICE OF SOUTH TEXAS INC: $14,000 · OtherHOSPICE OF SOUTH TEXAS INCGOOD SAMARITAN MINISTRIES: $11,125 · OtherGOOD SAMARITAN MINISTRIESSOUTH TEXAS CHILDREN'S HOME: $9,000 · OtherHALO FLIGHT INC: $9,000 · OtherST CECILIA CATHOLIC SCHOOL: $8,250 · Other+7 more: $19,725 · Other+7 moreRONALD McDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES OF GREATER NORTH TEXAS INC: $12,000 · PhilanthropyDriscoll Children's Hospital: $11,000 · HealthREFUGIO ISD EDUCATION FOUNDATION: $8,500 · Education
Other$189,300Philanthropy$12,000Health$11,000Education$8,500

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

25%50%75%100%$1.0M$10M$100Mgrantee revenue →↑ funder's share of their budgetHOSPICE OF SOUTH TEXAS INC: $14,000 over 9y, 0.0% of budgetRONALD McDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES OF GREATER NORTH TEXAS INC: $12,000 over 9y, 0.2% of budgetDriscoll Children's Hospital: $11,000 over 9y, 0.0% of budgetHALO FLIGHT INC: $9,000 over 9y, 0.0% of budgetREFUGIO ISD EDUCATION FOUNDATION: $8,500 over 6y, 4.0% of budgetGOLDEN CRESCENT HABITAT FOR HUMANITY: $1,800 over 3y, 0.1% of budget
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.

  • Who funds HOSPICE OF SOUTH TEXAS INC ↗
  • Who funds RONALD McDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES OF GREATER NORTH TEXAS INC ↗
  • Who funds Driscoll Children's Hospital ↗
  • Who funds HALO FLIGHT INC ↗
  • Who funds REFUGIO ISD EDUCATION FOUNDATION ↗
  • Who funds GOLDEN CRESCENT HABITAT FOR HUMANITY ↗
  • Who funds GOLIAD COUNTY OUTREACH FOOD PANTRY ↗

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 Houston Commu…Amazonsmile Foundation
Greater Houston Community FoundationTX12.8× affinity4 shared granteesties to 1 of 1Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Greater Houston Community Foundation · Amazonsmile 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 O'Brien Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from O'Brien Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.

2024
’20’21’22’23’24’25
no gov · 00%0%1%3%5%funder's share of their income ↑0%1%3%4%5%share of the org’s income from government →
    no gov moneyreceives it· size = income
    0get no government money at all
    2report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)
    0rely on government for over half their income
    ⤢ axis zoomed · 0–5%
    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.

    On method. Every financial figure here is read from IRS e-file XML, the funder’s own 990/990-PF, and from the multi-year returns of the 20 grantees we resolved, each linked to its source. Grantee outcomes are each organization’s own program-service reporting (Form 990, Part III), read as association with funding, never as caused by it. Low-confidence name matches are suppressed rather than guessed. How we build these →

    How this is measured
    Each figure carries one of six labels. Filed is what the funder reported on its return. Official is another government record about an organization, such as a federal award or a charity register, joined by name where no shared identifier exists. Resolved is an identity we worked out where the filing named a recipient without an EIN, kept only above a measured confidence threshold. Computed is arithmetic over those, like themes, portfolio clusters and co-funder strength. Context is a statistic about a place rather than about an organization, which is what the need overlay is: it describes the area a grantee’s address sits in, not where its work lands. Inferred is drawn by a model from text, like the partnerships read out of public news and organization websites. Each is labeled where it appears.

    Generated from the IRS Form 990-PF e-file return for fiscal year 2025, released 2025. Filings run roughly 12 to 24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

    Source object · view filing

    Play a game based on O'Brien’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