How much does The Looker Foundation give?

The Looker Foundation reported 21 grants totaling $233,000 in its FY2024 IRS filing. It funded between 19 and 23 organizations a year over FY2018 to FY2023.

What does The Looker Foundation fund?

By grant dollars over FY2018 to FY2024, its largest causes are Arts & Culture (30%), Human Services (16%), Environment (13%).

Who are The Looker Foundation's largest grantees?

By total granted over FY2018 to FY2024: Childrens Creative Project ($207k), Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture Inc ($190k), Catholic Charities of Los Angeles Inc ($137k).

Does The Looker Foundation fund new organizations?

In FY2023, 26% of the organizations it funded were first-time grantees.

Does The Looker Foundation accept unsolicited applications?

Its most recent filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and does not take unsolicited requests. Check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.

Which funders back the same organizations as The Looker Foundation?

Its strongest co-funders, measured against what their size predicts, include Santa Barbara Foundation, Hutton Foundation Dba Hutton Parker Foundation, American Endowment Foundation.

Where is The Looker Foundation based?

The Looker Foundation is based in CA.

The Looker Foundation

The Looker Foundation at a glance

· Private foundation

The Looker Foundation

Its FY2024 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.

$233k

Granted FY2024still arriving

Grants FY2024still arriving

States reached

$40k

Largest

01What it funds

0199% classified

What it funded, over time

Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2018 to 2024.

Arts & Culture$517kHuman Services$284kEnvironment$222kEducation$141kHealth$138kPhilanthropy$102kInternational$85kAnimals$84kOther$0

02FY2024 · 21 grants

Where the money goes

Grants by size, and the largest recipients.

By grant size · FY2024

Under $10k10 grants · $37k
$10k–50k11 grants · $197k

$10,000

Median grant

States reached

$6.0M

Total assets

Largest grants
Recipient	Amount
CHILDREN'S CREATIVE PROJECT	$40,000
MOMENTUM WHEELS FOR HUMANITY	$25,000
SKOWHEGAN SCHOOL OF PTNG AND SCULP	$20,000
ST MARGARET'S CENTER	$20,000
Individual grant recipient	$15,000
ENVIRONMENTAL DEFENSE CENTER	$15,000
ENVIRONMENTAL DEFENSE FUND	$15,000
THE OJAI RAPTOR CENTER	$12,500
UCSD STUDENT-RUN FREE CLINIC PROJECT	$12,000
HELP OF OJAI INC	$12,000
SCHOOL ON WHEELS	$10,000
BROTHER BENNO'S CENTER	$9,000
CYCLING WITHOUT AGE SANTA BARBARA	$6,000
DIRECT RELIEF INTERNATIONAL	$5,000
DOCTOR'S WITHOUT BORDERS (MSF USA)	$5,000

02The need

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:

Its human-services grants (FY18–24, $223k) land where the poverty rate runs at 13%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 81% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Most of its grants land in higher-need ZIPs.

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.

Which US states its grants reach

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.

Where the work is directed

The same grants placed two ways: where each recipient sits, and where its stated purpose sends the money.

About 8% of The Looker Foundation’s grant dollars are earmarked for a different county than the recipient’s own address. By recipient address, 77% of the giving stays in CA; by stated purpose, 70%.

The Looker Foundationlessmore of its giving

Placed by recipient address · 2.9% directed abroad (not shown)

How this is measured

Recipient view: each grant at its grantee’s ZIP, mapped to a county. Directed view: each grant at the county its stated purpose names, falling back to the recipient’s county when the purpose names no place; US grants only. A county shows only if it carries the top 95% of that view’s dollars. Purposes are read from the funder’s own 990 grant descriptions.

03Its grantees

repeat funding

Who it funds again

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

96%of every dollar goes to organizations it has funded before.

$1.6M · 27 repeat orgs$73k to everyone else

Grantees it renews have grown median revenue +48% since the first grant, against +32% for those funded once.

27 repeat relationships: 18 still active in FY2024, 9 since wound down; 3 grantees were first funded in FY2024 (too recent to call).

How the two cohorts compare

Re-uppedFunded once

Organizations

Total granted

$1.6M

$62k

Median revenue growth · since first grant

+48%

+32%

Still filing today

59%

89%

New vs renewed · share of each year

In FY2024, 95% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $11k went to new ones.

RenewedFirst-time

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

Human ServicesArts & CultureEnvironmentEducationInternationalHealthOther

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

CC
CHILDRENS CREATIVE PROJECT
7× · 2018–2024 · $207k · revenue +32%
SS
SKOWHEGAN SCHOOL OF PAINTING AND SCULPTURE INC
7× · 2018–2024 · $190k · revenue +48%
CC
CATHOLIC CHARITIES OF LOS ANGELES INC
7× · 2018–2024 · $137k · revenue +48%

Funded once

SJ
ST JOSEPH CENTER
one grant, 2022 · $40k · revenue +17%
SB
Santa Barbara Bucket Brigadegraduated
one grant, 2020 · $5k · revenue +119%
CH
Children's Hospital Los Angeles
one grant, 2019 · $5k · revenue +17%

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.

The Climate Center

The Climate Center is a climate and energy policy nonprofit working to rapidly reduce climate pollution at scale, starting in California.

Education

The San Diego Foundation

The san diego foundation inspires enduring philanthropy and enables community solutions to improve the quality of life in our region.

Philanthropy

California Forward

Ca fwd drives action to identify solutions that can be taken to scale to meet the challenges the state is facing. the organization is driven by the belief that regional solutions across the state will help ensure economic, environmental,…

Public Benefit

The Union of Concerned Scientists Inc

The union of concerned scientists puts rigorous, independent science into action, developing solutions and advocating for a healthy, safe, and just future.

International

Los Angeles Regional Food Bank

The organization's mission is to mobilize resources to fight hunger in our community. to fulfill its mission, the food bank:* sources and acquires nutritious food and other products and distribute them to people experiencing nutrition…

—

Food Forward Inc

Food forward fights hunger and prevents food waste by rescuing fresh surplus produce, connecting this abundance with people experiencing food insecurity, and inspiring others to do the same.

Food & Nutrition

Community Foundation Santa Cruz County

To promote philanthropy to make santa cruz county a better place to live, now and in the future.we bring together people, ideas, and resources to inspire philanthropy and accomplish great things.

Philanthropy

Hollywood Food Coalition

Hollywood food coalition welcomes people to dinner each night. we rescue and redistribute food daily to other organizations. we care for our immediate community through our wellness program. we build community with and through our…

—

Friends of the Earth

Friends of the earth strives for a more healthy and just world by defendng the environment and human health while advancing social and economic justice by conducting research and education, transforming the economy so it protects the…

Environment

The California Channel

To distribute public affairs and other educational information in order to create an electronic bridge between californians and their public officials, and, in the process educate a new generation of voting citizens and civic leaders who…

—

Ucla Foundation

The ucla foundation is the giving, receiving, and investing arm of the ucla campus. the foundation enables private donors to help build, sustain and advance one of the world's finest academic and research institutions. private philanthropy…

Education

South Central Family Health Center

To improve the quality of life for the diverse communities we serve providing affordable and comprehensive healthcare and education in a welcoming multi-cultural environment.

Health

How this is measured

The grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Santa Barbara Foundation; the most unlike its peers is Childrens Creative Project. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.

05the grantee network

28 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. 28 of the 42 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.

Load-bearing (≥25% of a budget)

Early backer (in before they grew)

28/28

Grantees still filing

22/28

Grew since first funded

Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee

Arts & Culture$469,000Other$464,900Human Services$286,500Environment$215,000Education$140,600Crime & Legal$89,000International$62,500

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

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 FoundationCA15.4× affinity5 shared granteesties to 11 of 11Hover any node to trace its alignments.Compare side by side →

Open a dossier: Santa Barbara Foundation · Hutton Foundation Dba Hutton Parker Foundation · American Endowment Foundation · Jpmorgan Chase Foundation · Morgan Stanley Global Impact Funding Trust Inc · The Bank of America Charitable Foundation Inc · National Philanthropic Trust · Donor Advised Charitable Giving Inc · Network for Good · Vanguard Charitable Endowment Program · American Online Giving Foundation Inc · Fidelity Investments Charitable Gift Fund

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 Looker Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from The Looker Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.

2024

’20’21’22’23’24’25

no gov moneyreceives it· size = income

0get no government money at all

8report government grants on their 990 we could not trace to a source (not plotted)

0rely on government for over half their income

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.

Play a game based on Looker’s filings →

More from the funding graph

The unnamed billions

grants reported with no recipient in the public record

The regranting layer

51% of grant dollars land in the regranting layer

The DAF merry-go-round

$9.7B circulates between donor-advised funds

The endowment market

who holds foundation money, and what just moved

The camps

funders cluster by geography, not ideology

By state

where grant money is based, and what stays home