How much did THE FORBES FUNDS grant in FY2024?

A cause breakdown isn’t shown here: 45% of THE FORBES FUNDS’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

2018

upprize socialsocial innovationyoungdedicatedspecificpopulationsconsumer

2019

improvement buildingvoluntarism grantmakinghill districtmacedonia enrichmentpressleycreatingsuccess

2020

ensureuptownblockenvironmentalalleghenylibraryevery

2021

churchessewickleyaidlibrarysocialliveschildren

2022

gpnp votervoter registrationregistration educationpctvcorporationeducationalexplore

2023

equitystrategic plansharedmental health

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

03FY2024 · 9 grants

Where the money goes

Your grants by size, and where they go.

$20,000

Median grant

States reached

$9.8M

Total assets

Largest grants

POINT PARK UNIVERSITY$40,000
PITTSBURGH NATIONAL YOUTH BOXING DBA TEAM 412PITTSBURGH BOX 412$30,000
THE KINGSLEY ASSOCIATION$20,000
PEDIATRIC PALLIATIVE CARE COALITION$20,000
PASSPORT ACADEMY CHARTER SCHOOL$20,000
TZOHAR SEMINARY DBA TZOHAR ARTS$10,000
25 CARRICK AVE PROJECT DBA TECH 25$10,000
PITTSBURGH CURE SARCOMA$10,000
JEWISH FEDERATION OF GREATER PITTSBURGH$10,000

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 (FY17–24, $438k) land where the poverty rate runs at 11% — the area typically sits at 12%. 0% of those dollars reach neighborhoods with above-average need. Your grants skew toward lower-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.

26%of every dollar goes to organizations you’ve funded before.

$773k · 19 repeat orgs$2.2M to everyone else

19 repeat relationships — 3 still active in FY2024, 16 since wound down; 6 grantees were first funded in FY2024 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

Total granted

$773k

$2.0M

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+37%

+41%

Still filing today

89%

80%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2024, 29% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $120k went to new ones.

RenewedFirst-time

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

Human ServicesCommunity ImprovementYouth DevelopmentHealthEnvironmentEducationOther

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

LC
LARIMER CONSENSUS GROUP INC
3× · 2019–2022 · $70k · revenue +201%
OB
OPERATION BETTER BLOCK
2× · 2020–2022 · $70k · revenue +85%
SS
SHADOW STUDENT ATHLETE DEVELOPMENT SERVICES INC
2× · 2017–2023 · $50k · revenue +119%

Funded once

B
BLASTPOINT
one grant, 2017 · $160k
TI
TALKMEUP INC
one grant, 2018 · $160k
CB
CC BUSY INC
one grant, 2018 · $110k

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.

World Affairs Council of Pittsburgh

To convene and connect people around global issues to build a competitive, thriving, and inclusive pittsburgh.

International

Pittsburgh Community Broadcasting

To create and distribute trusted content, build connections and strengthen our community through public media.

Arts & Culture

Community Action Commission

Community action commission's mission is to build on the strengths and resources available, provide solutions for complex issues, and empower individuals, families, and communities to move out of poverty.

Human Services

Allegheny County Conservation District

The Allegheny County Conservation District is an urban conservation district that engages and leads through partnerships, innovation, and implementation to conserve, promote, and improve Allegheny Countys natural resources.

Environment

Scenic Pittsburgh

To protect, preserve, and promote the scenic resources of southwestern pennsylvania.

Environment

Philadelphia Chinatown Development

Pcdc provides bilingual, culturally sensitive assistance and services to clients in philadelphia's chinatown neighborhood

Community Improvement

Service Coordination Unlimited Inc

To coordinate services to empower people in their pursuit of independence and interdependence

Health

Riverlife

Riverlife's mission is to create, activate, and celebrate pittsburgh's riverfronts, connecting people through exceptional places and experiences.

Environment

The Regional Opportunity Center

To accelerate the business community toward equitable, inclusive, and diverse workplaces, creating a future-forward region.

Arts & Culture

Philadelphia Works Inc

Philadelphia works, inc. strives to build a stronger workforce through career, skills training, employment services for career seekers, business services for employers, and labor market insights for smart workforce solutions and innovation.

Employment

Pittsburgh United

Pittsburgh United, Inc. strives to advance social & economic justice in the

Community Improvement

Greater Pittsburgh Chamber of Commerce

Advocacy to improve the business climate and quality of life in southwestern pennsylvania.

Community Improvement

For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Green Building Alliance and the most unlike its peers is Carnegie Institute. 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 26 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 4% of your money.

Closures · last 5 years

The orgs you fund almost never close — 4% lost their exemption, against 7% of the field you don’t fund.

orgs you fund

4%4/112

the rest of the field

640/9,794

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

100 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)

93/100

Grantees still filing

75/100

Grew since you first funded

Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee

Other$1,651,490Human Services$437,970Youth Development$183,000Health$178,000Community Improvement$172,500Environment$170,000Housing & Shelter$144,000

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 Pittsburgh FoundationPA105.3× affinity75 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: The Pittsburgh Foundation · The Heinz Endowments · Hillman Family Foundations · Richard King Mellon Foundation · The United Way of Southwestern · The Grable Foundation · Upmc Group · Jefferson Regional Foundation · Poise Foundation · Staunton Farm Foundation · McAuley Ministries · The Buhl 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 organisation THE FORBES FUNDS 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.

2024

’20’21’22’23’24

no gov moneyreceives it· size = income

1get no government money at all

0rely on government for over half their income

typical government reliance, FY20–24

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: WOMEN IN TECH PITTSBURGH.

Agentic due diligence · confidence × risk

Financial management

low risk

~11 months of operating runway; revenue grew over 4 filed years.

Track record & reputation

medium risk

4 years of Form 990 filings, still active.

Legal standing

low risk

US 501(c)(3); EIN 843890910 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 WOMEN IN TECH PITTSBURGH, 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 11 months of cash on hand.
On trackSustained operations— Filing through 2024; revenue grew over the period.
On trackReliance on your funding— Your grants peaked at 31% of their budget — diversified.
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 The Forbes Funds?

Find your warmest path to The Forbes Funds 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.

THE FORBES FUNDS

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

100 grantees, every filing reconciled, 2017–2025.

Government reliance of your grantees

Your grantmaking, live and operational

How do I get to The Forbes Funds?

More from the funding graph

THE FORBES FUNDS

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

100 grantees, every filing reconciled, 2017–2025.

Government reliance of your grantees

Your grantmaking, live and operational

How do I get to The Forbes Funds?

More from the funding graph