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· Public charity

The Foundation for Santa Barbara City College

The sbcc foundation fuels the excellence of santa barbara city college by engaging the community, building relationships, and inviting the generosity of donors.

$3.3M
Granted FY2025still arriving
2
Grants FY2025still arriving
1
States reached
$2.9M
Largest
01What it funds
01100% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2017 to 2025.

Education$32MPublic Safety & Disaster$2.4MCommunity Improvement$850kPublic Benefit$390kArts & Culture$97kRecreation & Sports$24kPhilanthropy$10kEnvironment$7k
02FY2025 · 2 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

$2,917,872
Median grant
1
States reached
$104M
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
SANTA BARBARA CITY COLLEGE$2,917,872
YES ON P FOR SBCC$389,721
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 (FY17–25) land where the poverty rate runs at 14%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 100% of its dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of its grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

area typical 11%YES ON P FOR SBCC: $390k → 12%SANTA BARBARA MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY: $97k → 14%THE SAN MARCOS HIGH SCHOOL ROYAL PRIDE FOUNDATION: $100k → 14%SANTA BARBARA CITY COLLEGE: $4.2M → 14%SANTA BARBARA CITY COLLEGE: $3.9M → 14%SANTA BARBARA CITY COLLEGE: $3.8M → 14%SANTA BARBARA CITY COLLEGE: $3.4M → 14%SANTA BARBARA SUPPORT NETWORK: $310k → 14%SANTA BARBARA CITY COLLEGE: $40k → 14%SANTA BARBARA CITY COLLEGE: $4.0M → 14%PARTNERS IN COMMUNITY RENEWAL: $965k → 14%AKILI PROJECT DBA SPORTS INDUSTRY ACADEMY: $24k → 14%SANTA BARBARA CITY COLLEGE: $3.4M → 14%MEM EMPLOYEE OWNERSHIP TRUST UDT DATED AUGUST 3 2022: $850k → 14%SANTA BARBARA SUPPORT NETWORK: $18k → 14%SANTA BARBARA CITY COLLEGE: $3.2M → 14%SANTA BARBARA BUCKET BRIGADE: $815k → 14%STARR KINNG PARENT-CHILD WORKSHOP: $10k → 14%SANTA BARBARA CITY COLLEGE: $2.9M → 14%SANTA BARBARA BUCKET BRIGADE: $192k → 14%EXPLORE ECOLOGY: $7k → 14%SANTA BARBARA CITY COLLEGE: $2.8M → 14%SANTA BARBARA BUCKET BRIGADE: $24k → 14%SANTA BARBARA CITY COLLEGE: $50 → 14%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 grantees
repeat funding

Who it funds again

Organizations funded in more than one year, against those funded once.

93%of every dollar goes to organizations it has funded before.
$33M · 3 repeat orgs$2.5M to everyone else

3 repeat relationships: 1 still active in FY2025, 2 since wound down; 1 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

3
9

Total granted

$33M
$2.1M

Median revenue growth · since first grant

-41%
+41%

Still filing today

33%
78%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2025, 88% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $390k went to new ones.

50%100%’17’18’19’20’21’22’23’24’25
RenewedFirst-time

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

’17’18’19’20’21’22’23’24’25
EducationPublic Safety & DisasterCommunity ImprovementPhilanthropyEnvironmentArts & CultureOther
How this is measured
First-time means a grantee’s first year in the filing window; renewed means funded in an earlier year too. The renewed share climbs naturally as a portfolio matures, so the signal is a year that bucks it (a wave of new grantees). 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

  • SB
    SANTA BARBARA CITY COLLEGE
    9× · 2017–2025 · $32M
  • SB
    Santa Barbara Bucket Brigade
    3× · 2018–2020 · $1.0M · revenue -41% · 72% of their budget
  • SB
    SANTA BARBARA SUPPORT NETWORK
    2× · 2018–2019 · $328k

Funded once

  • PI
    PARTNERS IN COMMUNITY RENEWAL Attn CURTIS SKENE
    one grant, 2020 · $965k · revenue ×28
  • ME
    MEM EMPLOYEE OWNERSHIP TRUST UDT DATED AUGUST 3 2022
    one grant, 2023 · $850k
  • SM
    SAN MARCOS HIGH SCHOOL ROYAL PRIDE FOUNDATIONgraduated
    one grant, 2024 · $100k · revenue +119%
How this is measured

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

04Its field

Closest unfunded matches

The nonprofits that most resemble its grantees but are not funded by it, scored along the direction from the rest of the field toward the portfolio. A resemblance in what they say they do, not a recommendation.

1
Santa Barbara Education Foundation

Santa Barbara Education Foundation (SBEF) provides and supports programs that enrich the academic, artistic, and personal development of all students in the Santa Barbara Unified School District.

Education
2
Santa Barbara County Trails Council

Our mission is to protect public trail access build and maintain safe and sustainable trails and promote public engagement in land stewardship and trail use for all types of outdoor recreation.

Recreation & Sports
3
Sonoma Botanical Garden
—
4
Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute
—
5
Santa Barbara Channelkeeper Inc

The organization was established to protect and restore the santa barbara channel and its watersheds through science-based advocacy, education, field work, community engagement, and citizen enforcement of environmental laws.

Environment
6
Santa Barbara Public Library Foundation

The santa barbara public library foundation supports the long-term health and sustainability of the santa barbara public library through public-private partnerships.

Public Benefit
7
Foundation for Santa Barbara High School

Mission:the foundation for sbhs partners with sbhs leadership to evaluate and fund emergent needs that are outside the scope of the school budget.vision: the foundation for sbhs aims to create the premier public high school where every…

Education
8
Santa Barbara Beautiful

Community beautification

Environment
9
Santa Barbara Mountain Bike Trail Volunteers Inc

Maintain and improve Santa Barbara trails to reduce risk and increase the enjoyment of all users.

Recreation & Sports
10
Santa Barbara Middle School

To operate a school for grades 6-9, delivering a holistic program of academics, arts & athletics, community service, and outdoor education that fosters passion for life and learning, self trust, strength and courage to succeed, and…

Education
11
The Foundation for Santa Barbara City College

The sbcc foundation fuels the excellence of santa barbara city college by engaging the community, building relationships, and inviting the generosity of donors. the resources raised and managed by the foundation enrich college programs,…

Education
12
Santa Barbara Botanic Garden

To conserve native plants and habitats for the health and well-being of people and our planet.

Environment
How this is measured
The grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History; the most unlike its peers is Partners in Community Renewal Attn Curtis Skene. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
04the grantee network

10 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. 10 of the 13 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.

2
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
2
Early backer (in before they grew)
9/10
Grantees still filing
5/10
Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

SANTA BARBARA CITY COLLEGE: $31,778,323 · OtherSANTA BARBARA CITY COLLEGE+3 more: $1,567,982 · OtherSanta Barbara Bucket Brigade: $1,030,576 · Public Safety & DisasterPARTNERS IN COMMUNITY RENEWAL Attn CURTIS SKENE: $965,250 · Community ImprovementSAN MARCOS HIGH SCHOOL ROYAL PRIDE FOUNDATION: $100,000 · EducationStarr-King Parent-Child Workshop: $10,000 · EducationFORMATIVE FOUNDATION: $6,979 · EducationSANTA BARBARA MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY: $96,989 · Arts & CultureTHE AKILI PROJECT: $24,145 · Youth DevelopmentFUND FOR SANTA BARBARA INC: $10,000 · PhilanthropyEXPLORE ECOLOGY: $7,000 · Environment
Other$33,346,305Public Safety & Disaster$1,030,576Community Improvement$965,250Education$116,979Arts & Culture$96,989Youth Development$24,145Philanthropy$10,000Environment$7,000

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

25%50%75%100%$100k$1.0M$10Mgrantee revenue →↑ funder's share of their budgetSanta Barbara Bucket Brigade: $1,030,576 over 3y, 72% of budgetSAN MARCOS HIGH SCHOOL ROYAL PRIDE FOUNDATION: $100,000 over 1y, 23% of budgetSANTA BARBARA MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY: $96,989 over 1y, 0.9% of budgetTHE AKILI PROJECT: $24,145 over 1y, 32% of budgetStarr-King Parent-Child Workshop: $10,000 over 1y, 3.7% of budgetFUND FOR SANTA BARBARA INC: $10,000 over 1y, 0.4% of budgetEXPLORE ECOLOGY: $7,000 over 1y, 0.5% of budgetFORMATIVE FOUNDATION: $6,979 over 1y, 1.1% 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.

Co-funders

Grantmakers whose grantees overlap with this funder’s far more than size alone predicts. Closer means stronger alignment; arcs show where they also fund each other. Here they form a tightly interlocked group: most of these funders back each other's grantees too.

Santa Barbara FoundationCA13.4× affinity4 shared granteesties to 3 of 3Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Santa Barbara Foundation · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund · Amazonsmile Foundation

How this is measured
Affinity is a Gamma-Poisson posterior co-funding rate, re-centered on the typical rate, so thin evidence shrinks toward no signal. Overlap is association, not proof of shared intent.

How much its grantees rely on government

Each dot is one organization The Foundation for Santa Barbara City College funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from The Foundation for Santa Barbara City College. Bigger dots raise more.

2024
’20’21’22’23’24’25
no gov · 00%6%25%56%100%funder's share of their income ↑0%3%5%8%10%share of the org’s income from government →
    no gov moneyreceives it· size = income
    0get no government money at all
    3report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)
    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.

    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 13 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 e-file return for fiscal year 2025, released 2025. Filings run roughly 12 to 24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

    Source object · view filing

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