· Private foundation
Thelma Doelger Trust for Animals
Its FY2025 filing reports that it accepted unsolicited grant applications.
What you funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year — across FY2017–2025.
Where the money goes
Your grants by size, and where they go.
By grant size · FY2025
- Under $10k3 grants · $15k
- $10k–50k17 grants · $345k
- $50k–250k1 grant · $50k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| HUMANE SOCIETY OF SONOMA COUNTY | $50,000 |
| VETS IN VANS | $35,000 |
| HUMANE SOCIETY OF TRUCKEE-TAHOE | $35,000 |
| FIX OUR FERALS | $25,000 |
| CAT TOWN | $25,000 |
| PASADENA HUMANE | $25,000 |
| MARINE MAMMAL CENTER | $25,000 |
| FRIENDS OF OAKLAND ANIMAL SERVICES | $25,000 |
| SAN FRANCISCO COMMUNITY CLINIC CONSORTIUM | $25,000 |
| EAST BAY SPCA | $20,000 |
| ANIMAL LEGAL DEFENSE FUND | $20,000 |
| PETS LIFELINE | $15,000 |
| COMPASSION WITHOUT BORDERS | $15,000 |
| EARTH ISLAND INSTITUTE | $15,000 |
| TOWN CATS OF MORGAN HILL | $10,000 |
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 (FY21–24, $96k) land where the poverty rate runs at 10%, 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.
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 +39% since the first grant, against +29% for the ones you funded once.
33 repeat relationships — 16 still active in FY2025, 17 since wound down; 5 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, 82% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $75k 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
- TMTHE MARINE MAMMAL CENTER8× · 2017–2025 · $375k · revenue +101%
- HSHUMANE SOCIETY OF TRUCKEE-TAHOE7× · 2018–2025 · $180k · revenue +145%
- IBINTERNATIONAL BIRD RESCUE5× · 2018–2024 · $180k · revenue +88%
Funded once
- FOFRIENDS OF ALAMEDA ANIMAL SHELTERone grant, 2022 · $20k
- PSPLACER SCPAone grant, 2017 · $20k
- EMEASTERN MADERA COUNTRY SPCAone grant, 2018 · $20k
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.
C.A.R.E.S.MISSION STATEMENT*Rescue, foster and find good homes for abandoned and homeless domestic and farm animals.*Spay/neuter abandoned and homeless cats and dogs, as well as help low income families with same.*Conduct TNR+ programs to…
The SPCA Monterey County's Mission is assuring compassionate treatment of all animals through rescue, rehabilitation, protection and education. The SPCA shelters homeless, neglected, and abused pets, including dogs, cats, horses, exotic…
We work in cooperation with humane organizations shelters and other groups interested in animal rescue. We rescue domestic animals and place them in nurturing foster homes. All animals are evaluated altered and vaccinated prior to…
A champion for animals since 1967, PAWS is a nationally recognized leader - rehabilitating injured and orphaned wildlife, sheltering and adopting homeless cats and dogs, and educating people to make a better world for animals and people.
High Sierra Animal Rescues mission is to save the lives of homeless dogs in the regions served. Our staff and volunteers are dedicated to making our communities better through successful adoptions advancing their welfare and creating human…
We are dedicated to building a community responsible for pet stewardship and humane treatment of animals.
Animal Care and Adoption - ARR's mission is to save the lives of homeless and abandoned dogs and cats. Our goal is reaching a no-kill society in the United States.
To facilitate and assist in the care and adoption of homeless domestic animals and dissemination of information encouraging spaying and neutering.
To improve the health & well-being of animals through veterinary aid, response, training, research & local capacity building worldwide. We provide services to companion animals, horses, street dogs, livestock and marine animals including…
All about animals rescue's mission is no more homeless pets.
We are committed to caring for homeless cats and dogs and establishing a no kill community for cats and dogs in Mendocino County, and educating their owners as well as the general populace. Our volunteers provide temporary shelter and…
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Cat Town and the most unlike its peers is Planet Bee Foundation. 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 30 years old; the field is 14. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 24% startups (under 5 years old) — 5% of your grantees by number, and just 3% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 0.0% lost their exemption, against 14% 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.
52 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. 52 of the 59 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 THE MARINE MAMMAL CENTER ↗
- Who funds HUMANE SOCIETY OF TRUCKEE-TAHOE ↗
- Who funds INTERNATIONAL BIRD RESCUE ↗
- Who funds CAT TOWN ↗
- Who funds HUMANE SOCIETY OF SONOMA COUNTY ↗
- Who funds FRIENDS OF THE PALO ALTO JUNIOR MUSEUM & ZOO ↗
- Who funds San Francisco Community Clinic Consortium ↗
- Who funds Pets Lifeline Inc ↗
- Who funds MUTTVILLE ↗
- Who funds FIX OUR FERALS ↗
- Who funds TRI COUNTY WILDLIFE CARE INC ↗
- Who funds EAST BAY SPCA ↗
- Who funds Gold Country Wildlife Rescue Inc ↗
- Who funds The Placer County Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals SPCA ↗
- Who funds Earth Island Institute Inc ↗
- Who funds ANIMAL LEGAL DEFENSE FUND INC ↗
- Who funds PEPPERWOOD FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds VETS IN VANS INC ↗
- Who funds CURIODYSSEY ↗
- Who funds THE BIRD RESCUE CENTER ↗
- Who funds POINT REYES BIRD OBSERVATORY ↗
- Who funds LINDSAY WILDLIFE MUSEUM ↗
- Who funds Wildcare Eastern Sierra ↗
- Who funds TOWN CATS OF MORGAN HILL ↗
- Who funds COMPASSION WITHOUT BORDERS ↗
- Who funds CONTRA COSTA HUMANE SOCIETY ↗
- Who funds FRIENDS OF OAKLAND ANIMAL SERVICES ↗
- Who funds PASADENA HUMANE ↗
- Who funds Nine Lives Foundation ↗
- Who funds HUMBOLDT SPAYNEUTER NETWORK ↗
- Who funds FRIENDS OF THE ALAMEDA ANIMAL SHELTER ↗
- Who funds Valley Humane SocietyInc ↗
- Who funds FieldHaven Feline Center ↗
- Who funds SILICON VALLEY PET PROJECT ↗
- Who funds ANIMALS IN NEED FUND ↗
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: Thornton S Jr and Katrina D Glide Foundation · The Duffield Family Foundation Dba Maddie's Fund · Petsmart Charities Inc · Petco Love · Marin Community Foundation · BISSELL Pet Foundation · The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals · McNabb Foundation · The Grey Muzzle Organization · The Michelson Found Animals Foundation Inc · Silicon Valley Community Foundation · Best Friends Animal Society
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 Thelma Doelger Trust for Animals 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 Thelma Doelger Trust for Animals?
Find your warmest path to Thelma Doelger Trust for Animals 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.