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Serenity Fund at a glance

· Private foundation

Serenity Fund

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.

$130k
Granted FY2025still arriving
4
Grants FY2025still arriving
2
States reached
$50k
Largest
01What it fundsRead
02The needRead
03Its granteesRead
04Its fieldRead
05Through PlinthRead
01What it funds
0196% classified

What it funded, over time

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

Philanthropy$223kHealth$86kFood & Nutrition$55kAnimals$50kHuman Services$20kEducation$15kRecreation & Sports$10kYouth Development$5kOther$0
02FY2025 · 4 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

By grant size · FY2025

  • Under $10k1 grant · $5k
  • $10k–50k1 grant · $25k
  • $50k–250k2 grants · $100k
$50,000
Median grant
2
States reached
$501k
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
COMMUNITY FOUNDATION OF JACKSON HOL$50,000
COMMUNITY CENTER FOR THE ARTS$50,000
PADRES FOUNDATION$25,000
SPECIAL FRIENDS FOUNDATION$5,000
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:

Its human-services grants (FY18–25, $25k) land where the poverty rate runs at 11%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 0% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Its grants skew toward lower-need ZIPs.

area typical 11%SPECIAL FRIENDS FOUNDATION: $5k → 11%SPECIAL FRIENDS FOUNDATION: $5k → 11%SPECIAL FRIENDS FOUNDATION: $5k → 11%SPECIAL FRIENDS FOUNDATION: $5k → 11%SPECIAL FRIENDS FOUNDATION: $5k → 11%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.
03Its grantees
repeat funding

Who it funds again

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

66%of every dollar goes to organizations it has funded before.
$301k · 6 repeat orgs$153k to everyone else

Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +87% since the first grant, against 0% for those funded once.

6 repeat relationships: 2 still active in FY2025, 4 since wound down; 1 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

6
6

Total granted

$301k
$103k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+87%
0%

Still filing today

67%
50%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2025, 38% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $50k 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
PhilanthropyHousing & ShelterAnimalsArts & CultureFood & NutritionHuman ServicesOther
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

  • PF
    PADRES FOUNDATION
    4× · 2022–2025 · $120k · revenue +75%
  • HF
    Hole Food Rescue
    3× · 2021–2024 · $45k · revenue +108%
  • SF
    SPECIAL FRIENDS FOUNDATION
    5× · 2018–2025 · $25k · revenue +87%

Funded once

  • FF
    FUZZY FRIENDS FOUNDATION
    one grant, 2024 · $50k · 91% of their budget
  • HV
    HOPE VILLAGE SAN DIEGO
    one grant, 2019 · $18k · revenue -83%
  • JC
    JACKSON CUPBOARD
    one grant, 2021 · $10k · revenue +165%
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.

1
San Francisco Challenge dba AmericaOne
Recreation & Sports
2
Usa Softball of Southern California Santee
Recreation & Sports
3
Sfcu Foundation
—
4
California Cricket Foundation
Recreation & Sports
5
Special Care Foundation for Companion Animals Inc
—
6
Sff Foundation
Philanthropy
7
Sappy Moffit Field Foundation Inc

SAPPY MOFFITT FIELD FOUNDATION INC exists to establish and maintain a baseball field -- "Foundry Field" -- at the publicly-owned Southeast Park in South Bend, Indiana. A portion of the park originally designated for a baseball facility was…

Recreation & Sports
8
Smart & Final Charitable Foundation

The Smart & Final Charitable Foundation is committed to giving back, improving quality of life, and nourishing the communities we serve. We focus our giving on Health & Wellness, Education, Hunger Relief, Team Sports & Youth Development,…

Public Safety & Disaster
9
New Door Opportunities

Feeding the homeless population in san d

Food & Nutrition
10
Urban Angels Sf

Urban Angels SF (Urban Angels) is a not-for-profit organization with the mission to sustain the homeless of San Francisco while they are in transition from living on the streets to safe permanent housing. Our volunteers provide sustenance…

Human Services
11
Jessica and Friends Community

Jessica and friends community (jfc) offers residential services, training in daily living skills, and social services to adults with developmental disabilities. the mission of jfc is to respond to the needs of those with developmental…

Health
12
The Jack Canine Foundation
—
How this is measured
The grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Community Foundation of Jackson Hole; the most unlike its peers is Aseltine School. 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

11 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. 11 of the 14 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.

1
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
7
Early backer (in before they grew)
9/11
Grantees still filing
8/11
Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

COMMUNITY FOUNDATION OF JACKSON HOLE: $150,000 · PhilanthropyCOMMUNITY FOUNDATION OF JACKSON HOLEPADRES FOUNDATION: $120,000 · PhilanthropyPADRES FOUNDATIONRADY CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL: $68,000 · OtherRADY CHILDREN'S HOSPITALTHE PIONEER FOUNDATION OF SAN DIEGO INC: $27,500 · OtherTHE PIONEER FOUNDATION OF S…JACKSON CUPBOARD: $10,000 · OtherJACKSON CUPBOARDIndividual grant recipient: $10,000 · OtherIndividual grant recipientREGGIE SMITH FOUNDATION INC: $10,000 · OtherREGGIE SMITH FOUNDATION INCASELTINE SCHOOL: $15,000 · OtherASELTINE SCHOOLJUST IN TIME FOR FOSTER YOUTH: $5,000 · OtherFUZZY FRIENDS FOUNDATION: $50,000 · AnimalsFUZZY FRI…Community Center for the Arts: $50,000 · Arts & CultureCommunity…Hole Food Rescue: $45,000 · Food & NutritionSPECIAL FRIENDS FOUNDATION: $25,000 · Human ServicesHOPE VILLAGE SAN DIEGO: $18,000 · Housing & Shelter
Philanthropy$270,000Other$145,500Animals$50,000Arts & Culture$50,000Food & Nutrition$45,000Human Services$25,000Housing & Shelter$18,000

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

25%50%75%100%$100k$1.0M$10Mgrantee revenue →↑ funder's share of their budgetCOMMUNITY FOUNDATION OF JACKSON HOLE: $150,000 over 3y, 0.1% of budgetPADRES FOUNDATION: $120,000 over 4y, 1.1% of budgetFUZZY FRIENDS FOUNDATION: $50,000 over 1y, 91% of budgetHole Food Rescue: $45,000 over 3y, 1.5% of budgetSPECIAL FRIENDS FOUNDATION: $25,000 over 5y, 1.3% of budgetHOPE VILLAGE SAN DIEGO: $18,000 over 1y, 6.8% of budgetASELTINE SCHOOL: $15,000 over 3y, 0.3% of budgetREGGIE SMITH FOUNDATION INC: $10,000 over 1y, 6.8% of budgetJUST IN TIME FOR FOSTER YOUTH: $5,000 over 1y, 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.

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 set of overlaps that mostly run through this funder rather than between each other.

Amazonsmile Foundation
Amazonsmile FoundationWA1.7× affinity4 shared granteesties to 0 of 0Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: 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 Serenity Fund funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from Serenity Fund. Bigger dots raise more.

2024
’20’21’22’23’24’25
no gov · 00%6%25%56%100%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.
    05Through Plinth

    Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

    How do I get to Serenity Fund?

    Find your warmest path to Serenity Fund 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.

    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 14 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 Serenity’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