· Private foundation
The Thomas 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 FY2022–2025.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2025
- Under $10k7 grants · $37k
- $10k–50k4 grants · $62k
- $50k–250k1 grant · $82k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| BREAKTHROUGH T1D | $81,500 |
| WAYNE STATE UNIVERSITY | $29,500 |
| BOLDLI | $12,000 |
| FORGOTTEN HARVEST | $10,000 |
| HIGHER HOPES | $10,000 |
| YAD EZRA | $8,000 |
| Individual grant recipient | $8,000 |
| UNITED NEGRO COLLEGE FUND | $8,000 |
| GLEANERS COMMUNITY FOOD BANK | $6,000 |
| SPECIAL OLYMPICS MICHIGAN | $3,000 |
| ST VINCENT & SARAH FISHER CENTER | $3,000 |
| MICHIGAN AVIATION EDUCATIN FOUNDATI | $1,000 |
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 (FY22–25, $40k) land where the poverty rate runs at 12%, against an area that typically sits at 12%. 30% of those dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Your grants skew toward lower-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.
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 +8% since the first grant, against 0% for the ones you funded once.
13 repeat relationships — 10 still active in FY2025, 3 since wound down; 2 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, 48% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $94k 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
- DIDETROIT INSTITUTE FOR CHILDREN3× · 2022–2024 · $39k · revenue +8%
FORGOTTEN HARVEST INC4× · 2022–2025 · $38k · revenue +6%- YEYAD EZRA4× · 2022–2025 · $34k · revenue +19%
Funded once
- BTBREAKTHROUGH T1Done grant, 2025 · $82k · revenue 0%
- BBOLDLIone grant, 2025 · $12k
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.
The organization was founded by a group of concerned citizens, working in cooperation with the detroit city council, to shape food policy and to work for a more localized, more just, and environmentally friendly food system. the…
Detroit food academy partners with local high schools, educators, and food entrepreneurs to facilitate a year-round program. as students develop food-based solutions in their communities, they grow as holistic leaders who are healthy,…
The Food Bank of Eastern Michigan's mission is to be the Food Source for people in need. Partnering with organizations to feed the hungry, we advocate and build a community solution to a community problem. By leveraging an abundance of…
The mission of metro food rescue is simple; waste less, feed more. we rescue food that would otherwise be discarded and deliver it to a network of food partners. thereby, helping to feed individuals and families in need.
Eastern market is organized to combat community deterioration and to lessen the burdens of government in managing its public market that has served detroit since 1891. eastern market operates the market under an agreement with the city of…
The mission of desc is to cultivate local workforce talent to align with the needs of the business community through partnerships with key workforce agencies, faith- and community- based organizations, education and training institutions,…
Alleviate and prevent hunger amongst Michigan residents.
We gather and distribute food to relieve hunger and increase food security in west michigan and the upper peninsula. contributions and net assets consist primarily of donated food for distribution.
Feeding the families in Metro Detroit
Gesher human services is a bridge to hope and opportunity for people at work, at home, and in the community. gesher's workforce development, behavioral health, and inclusion programming serves all metro detroiters while meeting the needs…
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Forgotten Harvest Inc and the most unlike its peers is Breakthrough T1D. Resemblance is measured on each organization’s own IRS 990 mission text; it reflects how work is described, not its quality or impact.
8 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. 8 of the 15 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.
Government reliance of your grantees
Every dot is one organization The Thomas 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.
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 Thomas Foundation?
Find your warmest path to The Thomas 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.