· Private foundation
The Robert and Esther Black Family Foundation
Its FY2025 filing reports that it funds preselected organizations and did not take unsolicited requests; check the foundation's own site before ruling it out.
What you funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2019–2025.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2025
- Under $10k17 grants · $96k
- $10k–50k26 grants · $563k
- $50k–250k9 grants · $618k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| DISCOVERY SCHOOL | $167,000 |
| RICHLAND COUNTY LAND BANK | $83,333 |
| UNITED WAY OF RICHLAND COUNTY | $61,000 |
| FENIMORE ART MUSEUM | $56,667 |
| THIRD STREET FAMILY HEALTH SERVICES | $50,000 |
| GREATER CLEVELAND FOOD BANK INC | $50,000 |
| NORTH CENTRAL STATE COLLEGE | $50,000 |
| THE GLIMMERGLASS FESTIVAL | $50,000 |
| COMMUNITY FOUNDATION OF | $50,000 |
| UPSTATE HOME FOR CHILDREN FD | $40,000 |
| RENAISSANCE PERFORMING ARTS ASSOC | $38,667 |
| RICHLAND ACADEMY OF THE ARTS | $38,333 |
| MANSFIELD ART CENTER | $38,333 |
| MANSFIELD CITY SCHOOLS | $33,333 |
| WAYFINDERS OHIO INC | $30,000 |
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 (FY19–25, $660k) land where the poverty rate runs at 13%, 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 +27% since the first grant, against +16% for the ones you funded once.
73 repeat relationships — 41 still active in FY2025, 32 since wound down; 9 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, 85% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $187k 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
- DSDISCOVERY SCHOOL INC7× · 2019–2025 · $296k · revenue +33%
- PPPLANNED PARENTHOOD OF GREATER OHIO7× · 2019–2025 · $281k · revenue +50%
- UWUNITED WAY OF RICHLAND COUNTY6× · 2019–2025 · $271k · revenue +16%
Funded once
- TRTAKING ROOT FARMS INCone grant, 2024 · $100k · revenue 0%
- NENORTH END COMMUNITY IMPROVEMENT COLLABORATIVE INCone grant, 2023 · $67k · revenue -54%
- OBOHIO BIRD SANCTUARYone grant, 2019 · $63k
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.
United way of central ohio is the local organization that harnesses the power of communities working together - people, nonprofits, businesses and government - to create a stronger, more equitable central ohio. see schedule o.we do this…
Museum has a mission to create opportunties for everyone to experience art that broadens understanding of the past, fosters community connections to the present, and creates diverse possbilities for the future.
To strengthen the capacity of United Ways across Ohio and to advance the common good for Ohioans.
Ohio hills health services is a non-profit health care operation, organized by communities in eastern ohio to promote healthy lifestyles and to provide preventative and comprehensive medical and dental care for area residents. the primary…
To identify, activate, and support informed and passionate philanthropists who strive to improve the quality of life in our community. we accomplish this by:- building a permanent source of charitable funding- cultivating strategic…
Global cleveland is dedicated to growing northeast ohio's economy by welcoming and connecting international people to opportunities and fostering a more inviting community for those seeking a place to call home.
The troy community land bank acquires, rehabilitates and resells vacant and abandoned buildings throughout the city of troy, new york
To reduce the conditions of poverty by providing comprehensive services to improve lives.to accomplish the mission, hhwp cac will collect and analyze data on the nature of poverty and the existing resources in the area. hhwp cac will…
The sandusky state theatre was originally created in 1928 and was reinvented several times since its inception. the arts, particularly the performing arts, are a reflection and a documentation of our culture and society. therefore, in…
Helping individuals live with dignity through the final stage of life.
Wheaton college provides a transformative liberal arts education, combining theory and practice, for intellectually curious students within a collaborative and vibrant extended community and network that values and strives to create an…
The orrville united way improves lives by unitiing people and resources to advance the common good in orrville, dalton and marshallville in eastern wayne county ohio. our goal is to create long-lasting changes that prevent future problems…
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Richland County Foundation and the most unlike its peers is Mansfield Community Playhouse Inc. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
Your grantees are a median of 46 years old; the field is 21. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 18% startups (under 5 years old) — 1% of your grantees by number, and just 0% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 0.0% lost their exemption, against 12% 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.
68 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. 68 of the 144 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
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 RICHLAND COUNTY FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds Mansfield Fine Arts Guild Inc ↗
- Who funds DISCOVERY SCHOOL INC ↗
- Who funds PLANNED PARENTHOOD OF GREATER OHIO ↗
- Who funds UNITED WAY OF RICHLAND COUNTY ↗
- Who funds FENIMORE ART MUSEUM ↗
- Who funds RENAISSANCE PERFORMING ARTS ASSOCIATION INC ↗
- Who funds GLIMMERGLASS OPERA THEATRE INC ↗
- Who funds OHIO BIRD SANCTUARY INC ↗
- Who funds UPSTATE HOME FOR CHILDREN FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds GREATER CLEVELAND FOOD BANK INC ↗
- Who funds THE YOUNG MEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION OF NORTH CENTRAL OHIO INC ↗
- Who funds ASHLAND SCHINES THEATER INC ↗
- Who funds RICHLAND ACADEMY OF THE ARTS ↗
- Who funds Third Street Community Clinic ↗
- Who funds UNITED WAY OF NORTH CENTRAL OHIO INC ↗
- Who funds TAKING ROOT FARMS INC ↗
- Who funds BUCKEYE IMAGINATION MUSEUM ↗
- Who funds THE DOMESTIC VIOLENCE SHELTER INC ↗
- Who funds THE TRUST FOR PUBLIC LAND ↗
- Who funds AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION OF OHIO FOUNDATION INC ↗
- Who funds HISTORIC SARANAC LAKE ↗
- Who funds NORTH END COMMUNITY IMPROVEMENT COLLABORATIVE INC ↗
- Who funds CATSKILL AREA HOSPICE AND PALLIATIVE CARE INC DBA HELIOS CARE ↗
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: Richland County Foundation · Park National Corporation Foundation · The Hire Family Foundation · Ashland County Community Foundation · Edith B & Joseph E Humphrey Family Foundation · The Milliron Foundation · The Milton R & Beulah M Young Foundation · Mightycause Charitable Foundation · Gorman Family Foundation · Donald & Alice Noble Foundation Inc · Firstenergy Foundation · Wayne County Community 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 Robert and Esther Black Family 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.
- United Way of Massachusetts Bay Inc — 23% of income from government
- President and Fellows of Harvard College — 7% of income from government
- Babson College — 3% of income from government
- Boston Symphony Orchestra Inc — 0% 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 Robert and Esther Black Family Foundation?
Find your warmest path to The Robert and Esther Black Family 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.