· Private foundation
Ray and Janet Scherr 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 $10k15 grants · $46k
- $10k–50k3 grants · $30k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| MOTOR4TOYS CHARITABLE FOUNDATION | $10,000 |
| TUNNEL TO TOWERS FOUNDATION | $10,000 |
| WOUNDED WARRIOR PROJECT | $10,000 |
| CHILDRENS HOSPITAL LOS ANGELES | $6,000 |
| ST JUDES | $5,000 |
| SEMPER FI & AMERICA'S FUND | $5,000 |
| PALISADES CHARTER HIGH SCHOOL | $5,000 |
| ALZHEIMERS DISEASE RESEARCH | $5,000 |
| CALIFORNIA COMMUNITY FOUNDATION | $3,000 |
| SHRINERS HOSPITALS | $3,000 |
| CITY OF HOPE | $2,000 |
| AMERICAN CANCER SOCIETY | $2,000 |
| CEDARS SINAI | $2,000 |
| MAKE-A-WISH AMERICA | $2,000 |
| ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN | $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.
Your human-services grants (FY20–25, $36k) land where the poverty rate runs at 13%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 83% of those 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.
23 repeat relationships — 15 still active in FY2025, 8 since wound down; 1 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, 93% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $5k 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
- TOTHOUSAND OAKS ALLIANCE FOR THE ARTS4× · 2020–2024 · $70k · revenue +15%
- SFSEMPER FI & AMERICA'S FUND5× · 2020–2025 · $45k · revenue +56%
CEDARS-SINAI MEDICAL CENTER7× · 2017–2025 · $36k · revenue +63%
Funded once
- COCITY OF THOUSAND OAKSone grant, 2019 · $50k
- SCSOS CHILDREN'S VILLAGES-USA INCone grant, 2018 · $25k · revenue -43%
- SRSUNRISE ROTARY FOUNDATIONone grant, 2024 · $10k · revenue 0%
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.
The Television Academy is dedicated to celebrating excellence, innovation and the advancement of the telecommunications arts and sciences through recognition, education and leadership, while fostering a diverse, inclusive and accessible…
The central mission of the university of southern california is the development of human beings and society as a whole through the cultivation and enrichment of the human mind and spirit. the principal means by which our mission is…
Spcala is dedicated to the prevention of cruelty to animals through education, law enforcement, intervention and advocacy.
The san diego foundation inspires enduring philanthropy and enables community solutions to improve the quality of life in our region.
To improve the quality of life for the diverse communities we serve providing affordable and comprehensive healthcare and education in a welcoming multi-cultural environment.
To distribute public affairs and other educational information in order to create an electronic bridge between californians and their public officials, and, in the process educate a new generation of voting citizens and civic leaders who…
Mission statement the mission of usc arcadia hospital foundation educates and inspires the community to generously support quality medical care at usc arcadia hospital.
The foundation's mission is to improve the oral health of all californians by supporting the dental profession and its efforts to meet community needs.
The uc santa barbara foundation actively works to further the goals of the university of california, santa barbara. the foundation seeks to maintain and nurture the university's quality and distinction. on behalf of the campus, the…
Santa barbara humane operates two campuses located in santa barbara and santa maria providing care for community-owned and homeless animals. both campuses offer affordable high quality veterinary care, compassionate behavior training…
Our goal is to sustainably improve animal welfare, provide veterinary care, and improve veterinary education globally. in order to achieve this goal, we work in over 10 countries, across 5 continents, supporting local people and animals,…
The association serves its members by creating resources that enable california school administrators to develop and apply creative leadership and management skills and in turn, improve the educational process for all students.
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is California Community Foundation and the most unlike its peers is Katz Family Charitable Trust. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
For each theme you fund, this compares how the sector’s money is shifting with how your own giving is shifting.
Sector change and giving change are each shown relative to their own range, growing (right) or shrinking (left); both normalized, so inflation isn’t mistaken for growth.
Your grantees are a median of 35 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) — 0% of your grantees by number, and just 0% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 4% 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.
27 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. 27 of the 45 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 UCLA FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds THOUSAND OAKS ALLIANCE FOR THE ARTS ↗
- Who funds VENTURA COUNTY COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds SEMPER FI & AMERICA'S FUND ↗
- Who funds CEDARS-SINAI MEDICAL CENTER ↗
- Who funds STEPHEN SILLER TUNNEL TO TOWERS FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds WOUNDED WARRIOR PROJECT INC ↗
- Who funds SOS CHILDREN'S VILLAGES-USA INC ↗
- Who funds Children's Hospital Los Angeles ↗
- Who funds ART CENTER COLLEGE OF DESIGN ↗
- Who funds THE AMELIA ISLAND CONCOURS D'ELEGANCE FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds SUNRISE ROTARY FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds KIDS INTERVENTION AND DIAGNOSTIC SERVICE CENTER ↗
- Who funds PALISADES CHARTER HIGH SCHOOL ↗
- Who funds CONEJO VALLEY SENIOR CONCERNS INC ↗
- Who funds CALIFORNIA COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds SONGWRITINGWITHINC ↗
- Who funds American Heart Association Inc ↗
- Who funds PETERSEN AUTOMOTIVE MUSEUM FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds GLOBAL FUND FOR WOMEN INC ↗
- Who funds ALZHEIMER'S DISEASE & RELATED DISORDERS ASSOCIATION INC ↗
- Who funds Extraordinary Families ↗
- Who funds PAW WORKS 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: Conrad N Hilton Foundation · The Bank of America Charitable Foundation Inc · Charities Aid Foundation America · Network for Good · National Philanthropic Trust · American Endowment Foundation · American Online Giving Foundation Inc · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund · Amazonsmile Foundation
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 Ray and Janet Scherr 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.
- Wounded Warrior Project Inc — 0% 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.
Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus
How do I get to Ray and Janet Scherr Foundation?
Find your warmest path to Ray and Janet Scherr 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.