How much did TENNESSEE BAR FOUNDATION grant in FY2024?

TENNESSEE BAR FOUNDATION reported 32 grants totaling $3,036,436 in its FY2024 IRS filing.

Where is TENNESSEE BAR FOUNDATION based?

TENNESSEE BAR FOUNDATION is based in TN.

TENNESSEE BAR FOUNDATION

Foundation Dossiers

· Public charity

TENNESSEE BAR FOUNDATION

To support agencies that provide civil legal services to the indigent, that work to improve the administration of justice and to provide law student assistance.

$3.0M

Granted FY2024

Grants

Communities

$699k

Largest

01What you fund

What you funded, over time

By grantee IRS cause code (NTEE).

A cause breakdown isn’t shown here: 55% of TENNESSEE BAR FOUNDATION’s grantee dollars go to organizations outside the IRS cause taxonomy (common for large international and research funders), so a chart would be mostly “unclassified” and misrepresent the portfolio.

02beneath the categories

Past the labels — and the year it shifted

Beneath the NTEE codes, this is what the grant descriptions actually say.

…and in their own words, year by year

2019

courtsjesus

2020

workersclientstrainproimplementwraparoundlawyers

2021

clientstrainlawyerswraparoundtechnologyattorneyrural

2022

agapesharetechnologyclientspaycannot affordappropriate

2023

housinginnocencecourtsimmigrationvictims domestictnjfonmemphis

2024

servesagapesharedefendantshousingchristiansafe

2025

studyadvancerightsdefendantshousingaidphysical

Words distinctive to each year’s grant purposes (TF-IDF) · event-driven terms in cyan.

03FY2024 · 32 grants

Where the money goes

Your grants by size, and where they go.

By grant size · FY2024

Under $10k2 grants · $13k
$10k–50k22 grants · $571k
$50k–250k4 grants · $383k
$250k+4 grants · $2.0M

$25,000

Median grant

States reached

$27M

Total assets

Largest grants

LEGAL AID OF EAST TENNESSEE$699,222
LEGAL AID SOCIETY OF MIDDLE TN AND THE CUMBERLANDS$695,120
MEMPHIS AREA LEGAL SERVICES INC$351,360
TENNESSEE JUSTICE CENTER$284,200
WEST TENNESSEE LEGAL SERVICES INC$207,900
TENNESSEE ALLIANCE FOR LEGAL SERVICES$75,000
TENNESSEE JUSTICE FOR OUR NEIGHBORS$50,000
TENNESSEE CASA ASSOCIATION INC$50,000
COMMUNITY LEGAL CENTER$49,500
TENNESSEE INNOCENCE PROJECT$45,000
YWCA KNOXVILLE AND THE TENNESSEE VALLEY$40,000
ADVOCATING OPPORTUNITY$40,000
CENTER OF HOPE$39,000
NASHVILLE CONFLICT RESOLUTION CENTER$30,000
CHOOSING JUSTICE INITIATIVE$30,000

02The need

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.

show:

Your human-services grants (FY18–24, $964k) land where the poverty rate runs at 15% — the area typically sits at 11%. 92% of those dollars reach neighborhoods with above-average need. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

grant to an above-average-need area below average· circle size = grant amount

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; 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, United Way ALICE — shown as context about the area, never attributed to your giving.

03Your edge

repeat funding

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.

87%of every dollar goes to organizations you’ve funded before.

$8.8M · 37 repeat orgs$1.3M to everyone else

And the relationships you keep tend to grow: grantees you re-up on have seen median revenue of +90% since the first grant, against +41% for the ones you funded once.

37 repeat relationships — 27 still active in FY2024, 10 since wound down; 5 grantees were first funded in FY2024 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

Total granted

$8.8M

$1.2M

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+90%

+41%

Still filing today

89%

67%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2024, 97% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $97k went to new ones.

RenewedFirst-time

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

Crime & LegalHuman ServicesHealthCivil RightsEducationReligionOther

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

LA
LEGAL AID OF EAST TENNESSEEMENTAL HEALTH
7× · 2018–2024 · $1.7M · revenue +47%
LA
LEGAL AID SOCIETY OF MIDDLE TN AND THE CUMBERLANDS
7× · 2018–2024 · $1.5M · revenue +122%
TJ
TENNESSEE JUSTICE CENTERINDEPENDENCE
7× · 2018–2024 · $1.2M · revenue +178%

Funded once

TL
TENNESSEE LEGAL INITIATIVES FUND
one grant, 2019 · $1.1M
DI
DISMAS INCgraduated
one grant, 2020 · $50k · revenue +178%
CO
CENTER OF HOPEgraduated
one grant, 2023 · $20k · revenue +27%

Repeat = funded in two or more distinct years; growth and survival are read from each grantee’s own subsequent IRS filings.

04Your field

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 Women's Advocacy Center

The mission of the women's advocacy center is to empower and support survivors and victims of domestic abuse in east shelby county, tennessee.

Religion

Casa of the Tennessee Heartland Inc

Provide advocacy for abused and neglected children in juvenile court.

Civil Rights

The Child Advocacy Center of Anderson Co Tn

To combat severe physical and sexual abuse and resulting trauma by coordinating and providing services in a child friendly, safe and nurturing environment.

Human Services

Ky Access to Justice Commission Inc

Provided access to the courts and high-quality legal representation for people with low and moderate incomes living in kentucky.

Crime & Legal

Legal Aid Society of Eastern Virginia

Legal aid society of eastern virginia provides non-criminal legal assistance to the indigent.

Crime & Legal

Tennessee Trial Lawyers Association

To serve members of the legal profession by keeping them informed on current developments.

—

Advocacy Center for Crime Victims

Our mission is affect community-level change through equitable advocacy, collaboration, prevention, and therapeutic services to all children and adults impacted by violence and abuse.

Education

Midpenn Legal Services

Provide civil legal services to low-income residents & survivors of domestic violence.

Crime & Legal

Casa of the Tennessee Valley

The mission of the organization is to provide a powerful voice for abused and neglected children by advocating for each child, within the court's jurisdiction, in order to ensure safety, permancy and an opportunity to thrive.

Human Services

Court Appointed Special Advocates

To be the voice for children who have been victims of abuse and/or neglect. Our vision is to serve every child in the Cheaha Region by providing them with a caring and competent trained volunteer.

Crime & Legal

Family Crisis Center Inc

The family crisis center provides intervention and advocacy for victims of sexual assault and domestic violence. this is done with counselors, court advocates and 24 hour shelter for victims and their children.

Human Services

Mediation Center of Kentucky Inc

Helping people resolve disputes through alternative dispute resolution

—

For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Legal Aid Society of Middle Tennessee and the most unlike its peers is Homesafe of Sumner Wilson and Robertson Counties. 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.

the sector your giving your giving is ahead of the sector the sector’s ahead of you· dot size = how much the theme matters to each side

Ordered by the change in your giving — leaning in on top, pulling back at the bottom. The bar between the two dots is how out of step you are with the sector. Hover any row for detail.

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 37 years old; the field is 18. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.

The field is 21% startups (under 5 years old) — 3% of your grantees by number, and just 0% of your money.

Closures · last 5 years

The orgs you fund almost never close — 2% lost their exemption, against 11% of the field you don’t fund.

orgs you fund

2%1/47

the rest of the field

11%

4,007/36,353

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.

05the grantee network

45 grantees, every filing reconciled, 2017–2025.

Each one resolved to its own IRS returns and tracked year by year — your grant beside their revenue.

Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)

Early backer (in before they grew)

42/45

Grantees still filing

39/45

Grew since you first funded

Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee

Other$5,564,477Crime & Legal$3,046,720Human Services$1,083,047Civil Rights$224,500Education$150,000Health$65,200Religion$35,000

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.

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.

The Community Foundation of MiddleTN32.9× affinity18 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: The Community Foundation of Middle · United Way of Middle Tennessee Inc · The Frist Foundation · Memorial Foundation Inc · Hca Healthcare Foundation · The Healing Trust · Nashville Predators Foundation · Community Foundation · Equal Justice Works · Mary Kay Ash Foundation · East Tennessee Foundation · Tennessee Alliance For

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 organisation TENNESSEE BAR 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.

2025

’20’21’22’23’24’25

no gov moneyreceives it· size = income

0get no government money at all

0rely on government for over half their income

typical government reliance, FY20–25

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. 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.

05Through Plinth

Through Plinth

Your grantmaking, live and operational

This dossier was generated cold from public filings. In Plinth it’s a working system — every applicant assessed and every grant monitored. Here’s a taste, run on one of your grantees: MEMPHIS BAR FOUNDATION901 LEGAL CONNECT.

Agentic due diligence · confidence × risk

Financial management

low risk

~40 months of operating runway; revenue grew over 7 filed years.

Track record & reputation

low risk

7 years of Form 990 filings, still active; revenue up 3.0× since.

Legal standing

low risk

US 501(c)(3); EIN 621117968 on file with current IRS Form 990 filings.

Governance

Live in Plinth

Board composition & governance documents — verified live in Plinth from the applicant.

Compliance & sanctions

Live in Plinth

OFAC / UN sanctions screening — run live in Plinth at assessment.

Program capacity

Live in Plinth

Staffing, M&E and activity alignment — assessed live in Plinth from submitted proposals.

Live · Plinth’s real DD engine

Run the actual assessment on MEMPHIS BAR FOUNDATION901 LEGAL CONNECT, cold from public data.

Generated live from public IRS filings + open web sources by Plinth’s agentic engine. Shown as an illustration of the product, not a formal assessment.

Post-award monitoring · continuous checks

On trackFinancial stability— Roughly 40 months of cash on hand.
On trackSustained operations— Filing through 2024; revenue grew over the period.
WatchReliance on your funding— Your grants peaked at 51% of their budget — load-bearing; a dependency Plinth would track.
Awaiting reportEvidence of delivery— Plinth collects the grantee's own monitoring reports post-award.

What you see here is static and public. In Plinth it’s operational — the full six-pillar framework on every applicant (with their own documents + live registry and sanctions checks), monitoring dashboards on every award, custom board reports, and eligibility routing for intake.

Agentic due diligenceMonitoring dashboardsCustom board reportsEligibility routing

Preview generated from this grantee’s public IRS filings and independent reporting. Pillars marked “live in Plinth” require the applicant’s submitted documents. Shown as illustration, not a formal assessment.

Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPro

How do I get to Tennessee Bar Foundation?

Find your warmest path to Tennessee Bar Foundation through people who sit on both boards. Search for your organization and Plinth traces the introduction across shared trustees and officers.

Every link is a documented governance overlap in public IRS 990 filings — not a personal network — and each hop carries its own confidence tier. Low-confidence or distant paths are held back rather than guessed.

TENNESSEE BAR FOUNDATION

What you funded, over time

Past the labels — and the year it shifted

Where the money goes

Do your dollars go where the need is?

Who you back again

Backed again, and grew

Funded once

45 grantees, every filing reconciled, 2017–2025.

Government reliance of your grantees

Your grantmaking, live and operational

How do I get to Tennessee Bar Foundation?

More from the funding graph

TENNESSEE BAR FOUNDATION

What you funded, over time

Past the labels — and the year it shifted

Where the money goes

Do your dollars go where the need is?

Who you back again

Backed again, and grew

Funded once

45 grantees, every filing reconciled, 2017–2025.

Government reliance of your grantees

Your grantmaking, live and operational

How do I get to Tennessee Bar Foundation?

More from the funding graph