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Plinth

· Private foundation

The John and Shirley Davies Foundation

Its FY2025 filing reports that it accepted unsolicited grant applications.

$24k
Granted FY2025still arriving
19
Grants FY2025still arriving
3
States reached
$3k
Largest
01What you fund
0190% classified

What you funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY20172025.

Health$60kHuman Services$42kYouth Development$23kFood & Nutrition$21kCrime & Legal$16kPhilanthropy$16kEducation$6kInternational$5kOther$0
02FY2025 · 19 grants

Where the money goes

Your grants by size, and where they go.

$1,000
Median grant
3
States reached
$208k
Total assets
Largest grants
RecipientAmount
COTA CHILDREN'S ORGAN TRANSPLANT ASSOCIATION INC$3,000
SACRED SELECTIONS$2,600
MATTHEW 25 MINISTRIES INC$2,000
COTA CHILDREN'S ORGAN TRANSPLANT ASSOCIATION INC$1,500
HOSPICE OF CINCINNATI$1,000
PROKIDS$1,000
BIG BROTHERS & BIG SISTERS OF GREATER CINCINNATI INC$1,000
SACRED SELECTIONS$1,000
Individual grant recipient$1,000
BIG BROTHERS & BIG SISTERS OF GREATER CINCINNATI INC$1,000
Individual grant recipient$1,000
SAFE HAVEN FARMS$1,000
BUILDING BLOCKS FOR KIDS$1,000
SAFE HAVEN FARMS$1,000
DAV-DISABLED AMERICAN VETERANS$1,000
02The need
03

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 (FY17–25, $33k) land where the poverty rate runs at 13%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 59% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of your grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

area typical 11%SACRED SELECTIONS: $500 → 18%SACRED SELECTIONS: $3k → 9%BE CONCERNED INC: $1k → 11%SACRED SELECTIONS: $1k → 18%SACRED SELECTIONS: $2k → 9%SACRED SELECTIONS: $1k → 18%SACRED SELECTIONS: $1k → 9%SACRED SELECTIONS: $1k → 18%SACRED SELECTIONS: $1k → 9%SACRED SELECTIONS: $1k → 9%SACRED SELECTIONS: $1k → 9%SACRED SELECTIONS: $1k → 9%SACRED SELECTIONS: $1k → 9%SACRED SELECTIONS: $1k → 9%SACRED SELECTIONS: $1k → 9%SACRED SELECTIONS: $777 → 9%KENZIE'S CLOSET: $500 → 16%RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES OF GREATER CINCINNATI INC: $3k → 16%RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES OF GREATER CINCINNATI INC: $3k → 16%RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES OF GREATER CINCINNATI INC: $2k → 16%RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES OF GREATER CINCINNATI INC: $1k → 16%RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES OF GREATER CINCINNATI INC: $1k → 16%RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES OF GREATER CINCINNATI INC: $1k → 16%KENZIE'S CLOSET: $1k → 16%KENZIE'S CLOSET: $500 → 16%KENZIE'S CLOSET: $500 → 16%SWEET CHEEKS DIAPER BANK: $1k → 16%SWEET CHEEKS DIAPER BANK: $500 → 16%SWEET CHEEKS DIAPER BANK: $500 → 16%0%20%40%50%more need →
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 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

IN
OH
CA
CO
KY
VA
TN
NC
TX
FL

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.

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.

90%of every dollar goes to organizations you’ve funded before.
$192k · 27 repeat orgs$21k to everyone else

And the relationships you keep tend to grow: grantees you re-up on have seen median revenue of +46% since the first grant, against +25% for the ones you funded once.

27 repeat relationships — 10 still active in FY2025, 17 since wound down; 2 grantees were first funded in FY2025 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

27
13

Total granted

$192k
$18k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+46%
+25%

Still filing today

63%
69%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2025, 87% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $3k 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
Human ServicesHealthEducationArts & CultureCrime & LegalPhilanthropyOther

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

  • SS
    SACRED SELECTIONS
    8× · 2018–2025 · $17k · revenue +97%
  • BB
    Building Blocks Foundation
    7× · 2017–2025 · $16k · revenue +37%
  • SH
    SAFE HAVEN FARMS INC
    8× · 2018–2025 · $15k · revenue +46%

Funded once

  • SP
    SAMARITAN'S PURSE
    one grant, 2024 · $5k · revenue 0%
  • PF
    PRISON FELLOWSHIP
    one grant, 2024 · $2k
  • BC
    BLOOD CANCER UNITED INC
    one grant, 2017 · $2k · revenue +4%

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.

1
Coalition of Care Greater Cincinnati

Coalition of Care of Greater Cincinnati exists to mobilize churches and to inspire volunteers to care for vulnerable children and fragile families.

Youth Development
2
Hope for Cleveland's Children
3
Payton's Lemonade Stand

To empower the next generation of philanthropists by harnessing the power of kids serving kids.

Philanthropy
4
Advocates for Kids

Advocates for Kids is committed to providing service and/or supporting organizations that serve children by providing experiences that empower them to realize their full potential. Advocates for Kids envisions children achieving a clearer…

Youth Development
5
Catholic Charities Southwestern Ohio

Catholic Charities Southwestern Ohio serves and empowers people through God's love in their times of vulnerability. We do so through a full range of local services that engage the community in building solidarity.

Human Services
6
Choices for Victims of Domestic Violence

To create a better world by serving people in need by operating food pantries, homeless shelters, a domestic violence shelter, affordable housing communities, senior living, assisted living and skilled care facilities, a home health care…

Human Services
7
Cincinnati Union Bethel

Empowering women to break the cycles of poverty, addiction, and human trafficking.

Human Services
8
Caring for Kids Inc

Caring for kids, inc. (cfk) is a private, non-profit, full-service adoption and foster care agency operating since 1995. cfk specializes in diverse and inclusive birth parent, foster care, adoption and behavioral health services. our…

Human Services
9
Legal Aid Society of Cincinnati

To resolve serious legal problems of low income people, to promote economic and family stability, and reduce poverty through effective legal assistance.

10
Cumberland Medical Center

Cumberland Medical Center provides quality healthcare, in alignment with Covenant Health's mission to serve the community by improving the quality of life through better health, regardless of the patient's ability to pay.

Health
11
The Jewish Foundation of Cincinnati
Philanthropy
12
Cain Cincy

Tranforms lives inspiring hope by providing nutritious food,crisis assistance,resources and compassion that respects human dignity building a more vibrant community. feeding bodies and souls through its choice food pantry,weekly community…

Religion

For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Coverd Greater Cincinnati and the most unlike its peers is Samaritan's Purse. 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.

← shrinkinggrowing →↓ leaning in → pulling backsteadyAnimal Rescue and AdoptionChild Abuse Advocacy Servic…Cancer Support OrganizationsHospice Care ServicesUrban Agriculture & Food Ac…Developmental Disabilities …Food Pantries & AssistanceDomestic Violence Crisis Se…Community Arts OrganizationsCommunity Health Centers
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 27 years old; the field is 19. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.

THE FIELDby orgYOUR GRANTEESby number18%0%<5yr12%0%5–10yr21%28%10–20yr14%32%20–35yr16%40%35–55yr20%0%55yr+
THE FIELDby orgYOUR MONEYby value18%0%<5yr12%0%5–10yr21%10%10–20yr14%42%20–35yr16%48%35–55yr20%0%55yr+

The field is 18% startups (under 5 years old) — 0% of your grantees by number, and just 0% of your money.

Closures · last 5 years

The orgs you fund almost never close 0.0% lost their exemption, against 11% of the field you don’t fund.

orgs you fund
0.0%0/28
the rest of the field
11%
8,037/74,278

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.

04the grantee network

28 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 20172025, not grant rows in a single year — so this will not match the grant count on the cover. 28 of the 42 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.

0
Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)
8
Early backer (in before they grew)
27/28
Grantees still filing
20/28
Grew since you first funded

Where your money sits — by cause, then by grantee

COTA - Children's Organ Transplant Association — $21,500 · OtherCOTA - Children's Organ Transplant AssociationBIG BROTHER BIG SISTER OF CINCINNATI — $12,500 · OtherBIG BROTHER BIG SISTER OF CINCINNATIIndividual grant recipient — $11,500 · OtherIndividual grant recipientDAV-DISABLED AMERICAN VETERANS — $9,000 · OtherDAV-DISABLED AMERICAN VETERANSJOSH CARES INC — $6,000 · OtherCAMP JOY — $5,000 · OtherOUR DAILY BREAD — $4,500 · OtherHOSPICE OF CINCINNATI INCORPORATED — $4,500 · OtherOHIO VALLEY VOICES — $6,000 · OtherSAMARITAN'S PURSE — $4,500 · Other+19 more — $27,500 · Other+19 moreSACRED SELECTIONS — $16,922 · Human ServicesSACRED SELECTIONSRONALD MCDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES OF GREATER CINCINNATI INC — $10,500 · Human ServicesRONALD MCDONALD H…KENZIE'S CLOSET — $2,500 · Human ServicesKENZIE'S CLOSETCOVERD GREATER CINCINNATI — $2,000 · Human ServicesCOVERD GREATER CI…+1 more — $1,000 · Human ServicesBuilding Blocks Foundation — $15,500 · PhilanthropySAFE HAVEN FARMS INC — $15,000 · Housing & ShelterProKids — $14,000 · Civil RightsMatthew 25 Ministries Inc — $12,500 · InternationalMelanoma Know More — $7,000 · HealthBLOOD CANCER UNITED INC — $1,500 · HealthFERNSIDE INC A CENTER FOR GRIEVING CHILDREN — $1,500 · HealthTHE DRAGONFLY FOUNDATION — $500 · Health
Other$112,500Human Services$32,922Philanthropy$15,500Housing & Shelter$15,000Civil Rights$14,000International$12,500Health$10,500

Each org by its size and your share of it — top-left is where you’re load-bearing

25%50%75%100%$100k$1.0M$10M$100Mgrantee revenue →↑ your share of their budgetCOTA - Children's Organ Transplant Association — $21,500 over 8y, 0.1% of budgetSACRED SELECTIONS — $16,922 over 8y, 0.1% of budgetBuilding Blocks Foundation — $15,500 over 7y, 1.8% of budgetSAFE HAVEN FARMS INC — $15,000 over 8y, 0.5% of budgetProKids — $14,000 over 8y, 0.0% of budgetMatthew 25 Ministries Inc — $12,500 over 9y, 0.0% of budgetRONALD MCDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES OF GREATER CINCINNATI INC — $10,500 over 6y, 0.0% of budgetMelanoma Know More — $7,000 over 6y, 1.7% of budgetOHIO VALLEY VOICES — $6,000 over 5y, 0.1% of budgetJOSH CARES INC — $6,000 over 2y, 0.5% of budgetSAMARITAN'S PURSE — $4,500 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetOUR DAILY BREAD — $4,500 over 5y, 0.1% of budgetHOSPICE OF CINCINNATI INCORPORATED — $4,500 over 6y, 0.0% of budgetKENZIE'S CLOSET — $2,500 over 4y, 0.1% of budgetBIG BROTHERS BIG SISTERS OF GREATER CINCINNATI INC — $2,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetCOVERD GREATER CINCINNATI — $2,000 over 3y, 0.1% of budgetEaster Seals Tristate — $1,500 over 3y, 0.0% of budgetBLOOD CANCER UNITED INC — $1,500 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetFERNSIDE INC A CENTER FOR GRIEVING CHILDREN — $1,500 over 3y, 0.1% of budgetTHE CARNEGIE VISUAL & PERFORMING ARTS CENTER — $1,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetTraffick911 — $1,000 over 2y, 0.1% of budgetJason Baker Foundation Inc — $1,000 over 1y, 3.3% of budgetALIVE AT LAST — $1,000 over 2y, 0.5% of budgetGORMAN HERITAGE FARM FOUNDATION — $1,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetSuperSeeds — $1,000 over 1y, 0.4% of budgetBE CONCERNED INC — $1,000 over 1y, 0.1% of budgetART OPPORTUNITIES INC — $1,000 over 1y, 0.0% of budgetTHE DRAGONFLY FOUNDATION — $500 over 1y, 0.0% of budget
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 COTA - Children's Organ Transplant Association
  • Who funds SACRED SELECTIONS
  • Who funds Building Blocks Foundation
  • Who funds SAFE HAVEN FARMS INC
  • Who funds ProKids
  • Who funds Matthew 25 Ministries Inc
  • Who funds RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES OF GREATER CINCINNATI INC
  • Who funds Melanoma Know More
  • Who funds OHIO VALLEY VOICES
  • Who funds JOSH CARES INC
  • Who funds SAMARITAN'S PURSE
  • Who funds OUR DAILY BREAD
  • Who funds HOSPICE OF CINCINNATI INCORPORATED
  • Who funds KENZIE'S CLOSET
  • Who funds BIG BROTHERS BIG SISTERS OF GREATER CINCINNATI INC
  • Who funds COVERD GREATER CINCINNATI
  • Who funds Easter Seals Tristate
  • Who funds BLOOD CANCER UNITED INC
  • Who funds FERNSIDE INC A CENTER FOR GRIEVING CHILDREN
  • Who funds THE CARNEGIE VISUAL & PERFORMING ARTS CENTER
  • Who funds Traffick911
  • Who funds Jason Baker Foundation Inc
  • Who funds ALIVE AT LAST
  • Who funds GORMAN HERITAGE FARM FOUNDATION
  • Who funds SuperSeeds
  • Who funds BE CONCERNED INC
  • Who funds ART OPPORTUNITIES 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.

Johnson Charitable Gift FundOH29.2× affinity12 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Johnson Charitable Gift Fund · The Greater Cincinnati Foundation · Ge Aerospace Foundation · Charles H Dater Foundation Inc · Elsa M Heisel Sule Charitable Trust 2005 · Duke Energy Foundation · William P Anderson Foundation Central Trust · The Thomas J Emery Memorial · The Wohlgemuth Herschede Foundation Co Fifth Third Bank Na Agent · Sutphin Family Foundation Ica · Millstone Fund · The Scripps Howard 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 John and Shirley Davies 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.

2024
202122232425
no gov · 00%0%1%3%5%your 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
    4report 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, FY2025

    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.

    05Through Plinth

    Warm introductions · Powered by PlinthPlus

    How do I get to The John and Shirley Davies Foundation?

    Find your warmest path to The John and Shirley Davies 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.

    On method. Every financial figure here is read directly from IRS e-file XML — your own 990/990-PF and the multi-year returns of the 42 grantees we resolved across every year we hold, several hundred filings in all (a different count from the grant rows on the cover, which are one fiscal year)— each linked to its source. Grantee achievements and outcomes are each organization’s own program-service reporting (Form 990, Part III); we read these as association with sustained funding — the foundation is one of several forces — suppress low-confidence name matches rather than guess, and say so where a figure rests on a single grant or filing. Not everything on this page is a filed figure, and the difference matters. Filed is what you reported on your 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. How we build these →

    Generated from your IRS Form 990-PF e-file return for fiscal year 2025, released 2025. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind; figures are dated accordingly.

    Source object · view filing

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