· Private foundation
Sycamore Charities Inc Xxx-Xx-Xxxx
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.
What you funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2020–2021.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2021
- Under $10k5 grants · $20k
- $10k–50k5 grants · $163k
- $50k–250k7 grants · $1.1M
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| SAFE PASSAGE INC | $166,452 |
| HOPE HAVEN OF DEKALB CNTY | $166,452 |
| KISHWAUKEE FAMILY YMCA | $158,952 |
| CASA DEKALB COUNTY INC | $156,451 |
| ELMWOOD CEMETERY | $153,452 |
| DEKALB CNTY HISTORY CENTER | $153,451 |
| FAMILY SERVICE AGENCY | $148,451 |
| DEKALB COUNTY COMMUNITY GARDENS | $40,000 |
| ADVENTUREWORKS OF DEKALB | $39,000 |
| SYCAMORE FOOD PANTRY | $37,500 |
| NORTHWESTERN MEDICINE HOSPITAL | $34,000 |
| DEKALB CNTY COMM FND | $12,000 |
| OPPORTUNITY HOUSE INC | $7,000 |
| PAY-IT-FORWARD HOUSE | $4,500 |
| SYCAMORE EDUCATION FOUNDATION | $4,000 |
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 (FY20–21, $340k) land where the poverty rate runs at 13%, against an area that typically sits at 10%. 100% 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.
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.
And the relationships you keep tend to grow: grantees you re-up on have seen median revenue of +38% since the first grant, against +13% for the ones you funded once.
15 repeat relationships — 15 still active in FY2021, 0 since wound down; 2 grantees were first funded in FY2021 (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 FY2021, 88% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $150k 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
- HHHOPE HAVEN OF DEKALB COUNTY INC2× · 2020–2021 · $176k · revenue +34%
- SPSAFE PASSAGE INC2× · 2020–2021 · $176k · revenue +40%
- KFKISHWAUKEE FAMILY YMCA2× · 2020–2021 · $164k · revenue +38%
Funded once
- VAVOLUNTARY ACTION CENTER OF NORTHERN ILLINOISone grant, 2020 · $3k · revenue +13%
- MMMIDWEST MUSEUM OFone grant, 2020 · $3k
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.
Prevent/intervene in child abuse situations
Responds to community needs with compassionate, Christ-centered programs and services
The mission is to unite people to provide decent and affordable housing for families in need
Elder care services of dekalb county, inc. was established to promote and further the welfare of senior citizens and their families who live in dekalb county, through the provision of services which improve their well being and quality of…
Providing assistance to victims of domestic violence
Provide counselling services to those in need due to crisis.
Our central Illinois organization provides programs and services to adults with disabilities; enriching their quality of life, promoting social change, and optimizing their potential for independence.
To provide residential and rehabilitation services to clients with mental illnesses
Counsel sexual assault victims and family members.
The dekalb co senior citizens councils mission statement is to promote, maintain, and enhance the quality of life for older persons and handicapped individuals
To improve the quality of life of the seniors, disabled persons and others in our community through services and programs that meet their physical, mental, emotional, intellectual and mobile needs.
To improve lives by sharing community resources
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Adventure Works of Dekalb County Inc and the most unlike its peers is Kishwaukee Family Ymca. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
13 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. 13 of the 19 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 HOPE HAVEN OF DEKALB COUNTY INC ↗
- Who funds SAFE PASSAGE INC ↗
- Who funds KISHWAUKEE FAMILY YMCA ↗
- Who funds CASA DeKalb County Inc ↗
- Who funds FAMILY SERVICE AGENCY OF DEKALB COUNTY INC ↗
- Who funds DEKALB COUNTY COMMUNITY GARDENS ↗
- Who funds ADVENTURE WORKS OF DEKALB COUNTY INC ↗
- Who funds OPPORTUNITY HOUSE INC ↗
- Who funds SYCAMORE EDUCATION FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds PAY IT FORWARD HOUSE NFP ↗
- Who funds KISHWAUKEE COLLEGE FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds VOLUNTARY ACTION CENTER OF NORTHERN ILLINOIS ↗
- Who funds KISHWAUKEE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA ↗
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: Dekalb County Community Foundation · Northwestern Memorial HealthCare Group · George E& Betty Bdutton Foundation · Douglas C & Lynn M Roberts Family Foundation · Ideal Industries Foundation · Kishwaukee United Way · Northern Illinois Food Bank · Nebraska Community Foundation · Charities Aid Foundation America · Baird Foundation Inc · The Bersted Foundation · Northwestern Memorial HealthCare
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 Sycamore Charities Inc Xxx-Xx-Xxxx 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.
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.