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Shepherd Foundation at a glance

· Private foundation

Shepherd Foundation

Its FY2021 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.

$798k
Granted FY2020
16
Grants FY2020
7
States reached
$200k
Largest
01What it fundsRead
02The needRead
03Its fieldRead
04Through PlinthRead

Read this first · the figures below need context

50% of Shepherd Foundation’s FY2021 grant dollars went to The Bessemer Giving Fund, not to grantees.

Its money now reaches organizations through that sponsor, which does not report who recommended each grant. FY2021 names 1 organization directly, so a portfolio cannot be read from it. Everything below is therefore FY2020, the last year Shepherd Foundation named its own grantees at scale: 6 organizations, $798k. It is dated, not current.

Organizations named directly on the return

6
’20
1
’21

Amber years are those where most dollars went to a sponsor.

01What it funds
01100% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2020 to 2021.

Health$570kPhilanthropy$422kArts & Culture$148kEducation$80k
02FY2020 · 16 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

By grant size · FY2020

  • Under $10k5 grants · $22k
  • $10k–50k4 grants · $117k
  • $50k–250k7 grants · $659k
$40,000
Median grant
7
States reached
$0
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
JUPITER MED CTR FDN$200,000
CHILDRENS HOSP OF PHIL$109,000
HACKENSACK UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER FOUNDATION$100,000
NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC$100,000
CUSHING ACADEMY$50,000
Individual grant recipient$50,000
HACKENSACK UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER FOUNDATION$50,000
MALTZ THEATER$40,000
Individual grant recipient$30,000
RAMAPO COLLEGE FOUNDATION$30,000
STECHER AND HOROWITZ FOUNDA$17,000
Individual grant recipient$9,000
KRIPALU CENTER FOR YOGA & H$5,200
WOLF TRAP FOUNDATION$4,000
FRIENDS OF THE MONTCLAIR AN$2,000
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 (FY20–21) land where the poverty rate runs at 12%, against an area that typically sits at 7%. 100% of its dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of its grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

area typical 7%CUSHING ACADEMY: $50k → 11%KRIPALU CENTER FOR YOGA & H: $5k → 12%BESSEMER GIVING FUND: $211k → 17%FUTURES WITHOUIT VIOLENCE: $9k → 14%JUPITER MED CTR FDN: $200k → 11%HACKENSACK UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER FOUNDATION: $100k → 7%THE BOV FOUNDATION INC: $211k → 11%KENNEDY CENTER: $2k → 14%FRIENDS OF THE MONTCLAIR AN: $2k → 16%WOLF TRAP FOUNDATION: $4k → 6%NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC: $100k → 17%MALTZ THEATER: $40k → 11%HACKENSACK UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER FOUNDATION: $50k → 7%STECHER AND HOROWITZ FOUNDA: $17k → 17%LOGGERHEAD MARINE LIFE: $50k → 11%RAMAPO COLLEGE FOUNDATION: $30k → 7%PER DEV: $30k → 17%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 field
04the 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 17 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)
0
Early backer (in before they grew)
7/7
Grantees still filing
6/7
Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

JUPITER MED CTR FDN: $200,000 · OtherJUPITER MED CTR FDNHACKENSACK MERIDIAN HEALTH INC: $150,000 · OtherHACKENSACK MERIDIAN HEALTH INCIndividual grant recipient: $50,000 · OtherIndividual grant recipientMALTZ THEATER: $40,000 · OtherMALTZ THEATERIndividual grant recipient: $30,000 · OtherIndividual grant recipientSTECHER AND HOROWITZ FOUNDA: $17,000 · Other+4 more: $18,000 · OtherTHE BESSEMER GIVING FUND: $211,000 · PhilanthropyTHE BESSEMER GIVING FUNDTHE BOV FOUNDATION INC: $211,000 · PhilanthropyTHE BOV FOUNDATION INCTHE CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL OF PHILADELPHIA: $109,000 · HealthTHE CHILDR…THE PHILHARMONIC SYMPHONY SOCIETY OF NY INC: $100,000 · Arts & CultureTHE PHILH…WOLF TRAP FOUNDATION FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS: $4,000 · Arts & CultureTHE TRUSTEES OF THE CUSHING ACADEMY: $50,000 · EducationRAMAPO COLLEGE FOUNDATION: $30,000 · Education
Other$505,000Philanthropy$422,000Health$109,000Arts & Culture$104,000Education$80,000

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

25%50%75%100%$10M$100Mgrantee revenue →↑ funder's share of their budgetTHE BESSEMER GIVING FUND: $211,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetTHE BOV FOUNDATION INC: $211,000 over 1y, 30% of budgetTHE CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL OF PHILADELPHIA: $109,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetTHE PHILHARMONIC SYMPHONY SOCIETY OF NY INC: $100,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetTHE TRUSTEES OF THE CUSHING ACADEMY: $50,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetRAMAPO COLLEGE FOUNDATION: $30,000 over 1y, 0.4% of budgetWOLF TRAP FOUNDATION FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS: $4,000 over 1y, 0.0% 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.

How much its grantees rely on government

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

2024
’20’21’22’23’24’25
no gov · 30%2%8%17%30%funder's share of their income ↑0%3%5%8%10%share of the org’s income from government →median 1%
  • Ramapo College Foundation: 1% of income from government
no gov moneyreceives it· size = income
3get no government money at all
0rely on government for over half their income
⤢ axis zoomed · 0–10%
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.
04Through Plinth

Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

How do I get to Shepherd Foundation?

Find your warmest path to Shepherd 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.

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 17 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 2020, released 2020. Filings run roughly 12 to 24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

Source object · view filing

Play a game based on Shepherd’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