· Private foundation
The Buhl Foundation
Its FY2025 filing reports that it accepted unsolicited grant applications.
What you funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2018–2025.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2025
- Under $10k8 grants · $42k
- $10k–50k43 grants · $1.0M
- $50k–250k28 grants · $2.2M
- $250k+4 grants · $1.0M
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| RIVERLIFE | $250,000 |
| THE PITTSBURGH CULTURAL TRUST | $250,000 |
| THE PITTSBURGH PROMISE FOUNDATION | $250,000 |
| PROJECT DESTINY INC | $250,000 |
| A SCHOOLS | $175,000 |
| RISING TIDE PARTNERS | $150,000 |
| PITTSBURGH PARKS CONSERVANCY | $125,000 |
| PITTSBURGH PARKS CONSERVANCY | $125,000 |
| ALLEGHENY COUNTY DEPARTMENT OF HUMAN SERVICES | $100,000 |
| PITTSBURGH HOUSING DEVELOPMENT | $100,000 |
| AFRICAN AMERICAN CULTURAL CENTER | $100,000 |
| CHARLES STREET AREA CORPORATION | $77,000 |
| NORTHSIDE CULTURAL COLLABORATIVE | $75,000 |
| THE HEAR FOUNDATION | $75,000 |
| SARAH HEINZ HOUSE | $75,000 |
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 (FY18–25, $3.7M) land where the poverty rate runs at 11%, 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.
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.
And the relationships you keep tend to grow: grantees you re-up on have seen median revenue of +20% since the first grant, against +3% for the ones you funded once.
138 repeat relationships — 43 still active in FY2025, 95 since wound down; 19 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, 79% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $897k 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
- PDPROJECT DESTINY INC8× · 2018–2025 · $1.8M · revenue +100%
- CICARNEGIE INSTITUTE4× · 2018–2021 · $1.1M · revenue +28%
- ASA SCHOOLS PITTSBURGH'S COMMUNITY ALLIANCE FOR PUBLIC EDUCATION8× · 2018–2025 · $1.1M · revenue +3%
Funded once
- TFTHE FRED ROGERS COMPANYone grant, 2019 · $200k · revenue +14%
- YOYMCA OF GREATHER PITTSBURGHone grant, 2022 · $150k
- GPGREATER PITTSBURGH COMMUNITY FOOD BANKgraduatedone grant, 2018 · $150k · revenue +83%
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.
To create a vibrant, responsible, and sustainable film and digital media sector in southwestern pennsylvania.
To create and distribute trusted content, build connections and strengthen our community through public media.
Provide information to decision maker in the pittsburgh region to promote economic prosperity, social equity, and environmental quality for sustainable solutions for communities and businesses.
To provide a means for sharing resources and information among members, engage in joint projects, and offer a common voice on educational matters.
The zoological society of pittsburgh is dedicated to being a leader in, and significant contributor to, the conservation of endangered and threatened species. the society provides an enjoyable family experience that fosters understanding,…
Membership organization formed to help tech companies succeed through a proven platform of business development, talent retention, government relations, and visibility services. companies at all growth stages use the pittsburgh technology…
Pidc plans and implements economic development initiatives (see schedule o) which enhance the competitive environment, generate jobs and produce higher tax ratables throughout philadelphia.
Pittsburgh center for creative reuse inspires creativity, conservation, and community engagement through reuse.
The western pennsylvania conservancy protects and restores exceptional places to provide our region with clean waters and healthy forests, wildlife and natural areas for the benefit of present and future generations. the conservancy…
To accelerate the adopotion of robotic solutions by bridging this large and dynamic community to the world.
Pidc dmc administers and coordinates various development projects for the city and other not-for-profit entities.
Pittsburgh United, Inc. strives to advance social & economic justice in the
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Urban League of Greater Pittsburgh and the most unlike its peers is The Greenwood Plan. 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 32 years old; the field is 20. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 16% startups (under 5 years old) — 3% of your grantees by number, and just 2% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 2% lost their exemption, against 8% 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.
186 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. 186 of the 250 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
Showing your 200 largest grantees by grant value.
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 THE PITTSBURGH PROMISE FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds PROJECT DESTINY INC ↗
- Who funds CARNEGIE INSTITUTE ↗
- Who funds A SCHOOLS PITTSBURGH'S COMMUNITY ALLIANCE FOR PUBLIC EDUCATION ↗
- Who funds THE UNITED WAY OF SOUTHWESTERN PENNSYLVANIA ↗
- Who funds RIVERLIFE ↗
- Who funds NEW SUN RISING ↗
- Who funds CHILDREN'S MUSEUM OF PITTSBURGH ↗
- Who funds PITTSBURGH PARKS CONSERVANCY ↗
- Who funds Fineview Citizens Council ↗
- Who funds AUBERLE ↗
- Who funds FOUNDATION OF HOPE INC ↗
- Who funds ALLEGHENY CONFERENCE ON COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT ↗
- Who funds PITTSBURGH CULTURAL TRUST ↗
- Who funds RISING TIDE PARTNERS ↗
- Who funds THE PITTSBURGH FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds URBAN IMPACT FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds NATIONAL AVIARY IN PITTSBURGH INC ↗
- Who funds NORTHSIDE CULTURAL COLLABORATIVE INC ↗
- Who funds THE CITIZEN SCIENCE LAB ↗
- Who funds NORTHSIDE INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT COMPANY ↗
- Who funds TRYING TOGETHER ↗
- Who funds THE MANCHESTER CITIZENS CORPORATION ↗
- Who funds MANCHESTER YOUTH DEVELOPMENT CENTER INC ↗
- Who funds POISE FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds URBAN LEAGUE OF GREATER PITTSBURGH ↗
- Who funds JEWISH FEDERATION OF GREATER PITTSBURGH ↗
- Who funds MANCHESTER ACADEMIC CHARTER SCHOOL ↗
- Who funds SARAH HEINZ HOUSE ASSOCIATION ↗
- Who funds THE FRED ROGERS COMPANY ↗
- Who funds CATHOLIC CHARITIES OF THE DIOCESE OF PGH ↗
- Who funds THE MENTORING PARTNERSHIP OF SW PA ↗
- Who funds THE HEAR FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds NORTHSIDE LEADERSHIP CONFERENCE ↗
- Who funds NEW HAZLETT CENTER FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS ↗
- Who funds PITTSBURGH OPERA 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: The Heinz Endowments · Hillman Family Foundations · The Grable Foundation · Richard King Mellon Foundation · The Pittsburgh Foundation · McCune Foundation Pnc Bank Na · The Fine Foundation · Eden Hall Foundation · Eqt Foundation · Staunton Farm Foundation 540-054 Dba Staunton Farm Foundation · The United Way of Southwestern Pennsylvania · Opportunity 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 The Buhl 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.
- The Filmmakers Collaborative Inc — 1% 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 The Buhl Foundation?
Find your warmest path to The Buhl 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.