· Public charity
Trail Blazers Foundation
The TRAIL BLAZERS FOUNDATION is dedicated to positively impacting the lives of individuals from communities that have been historically underserved or marginalized with a focus on where youth live, learn, and play.
Read this first · the figures below need context
71% of Trail Blazers Foundation’s FY2025 grant dollars went to The Oregon Community Foundation, not to grantees.
Its money now reaches organizations through that sponsor, which does not report who recommended each grant. FY2025 names 18 organizations directly, so a portfolio cannot be read from it.
Organizations named directly on the return
Amber years are those where most dollars went to a sponsor.
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.
The 19 grants below total $708,520 — the rows itemised in this filing. The $784,180 headline is the total grant expense reported on the return, so the remaining $75,660 is giving the schedule does not break out: grants under the $5,000 itemisation floor, grants to individuals, and grants reported on other schedules. Every figure below describes the itemised rows only.
By grant size · FY2025
- Under $10k7 grants · $43k
- $10k–50k11 grants · $166k
- $250k+1 grant · $500k
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| OREGON COMMUNITY FOUNDATION | $500,000 |
| YOUTH ORGANIZED AND UNITED TO HELP | $30,045 |
| WORD IS BOND | $28,618 |
| LEARN FRESH | $25,000 |
| KIDS UNLIMITED OF OREGON | $10,400 |
| NIXYAAWII COMMUNITY SCHOOL | $10,400 |
| KLAMATH COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT | $10,400 |
| MORROW COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT #1 | $10,300 |
| MARION COUNTY SCHOOL DISTRICT 24J | $10,200 |
| GREATER ALBANY PUBLIC SD 8J | $10,200 |
| FORT VANCOUVER HIGH SCHOOL BOOSTER CLUB | $10,100 |
| OAKLAND SCHOOL DISTRICT #1 | $10,000 |
| RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE | $7,597 |
| BRIAN GRANT FOUNDATION | $7,290 |
| JASON LEE PTA | $6,100 |
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 (FY19–23, $41k) land where the poverty rate runs at 11%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 65% 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.
26 repeat relationships — 8 still active in FY2025, 18 since wound down; 10 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, 61% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $81k 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
LEARN FRESH EDUCATION CO6× · 2019–2025 · $115k · revenue +132%- WIWORD IS BOND5× · 2021–2025 · $107k · revenue +39%
CHINESE PROGRESSIVE ASSOCIATION2× · 2021–2022 · $47k · revenue +26%
Funded once
Alliance for Global Justice Corpone grant, 2021 · $26k · revenue -91%
OREGON FOOD BANKone grant, 2020 · $25k · revenue +7%- PSPHOENIX-TALENT SCHOOL DISTRICT #4one grant, 2022 · $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.
We believe that the strength of our community lies in its diversity. we know the power of many different voices at the table. these voices resound from the hearts and minds of our youth, who hold the keys to a just, fair and sustainable…
Cascades academy is an engaged, vibrant community that weaves challenging academics with experiential learning to inspire socially responsible individuals ready for a diverse and changing world.
Next up amplifies the voice of diverse youth to achieve a more just oregon
The Mission of the Foundation for Portland Public Schools is to be a catalyst for increased educational opportunities, achievement, and equity for all Portland Public Schools students and staff.
Children's institute's mission is to leverage research, practice, policy, and advocacy to shift systems toward justice for families so that all of oregon's children, prenatal to grade 5, have access to opportunity.
The oregon center for public policy's mission is to achieve economic justice for all oregonians through research, analysis, and advocacy. ocpp works to change policies that foster economic security and stability for all oregonians. we do…
Next up amplifies the voice and leadership of diverse young people to achieve a more just and equitable oregon.
Oregon Justice Network is an alliance built and staffed by criminal legal system impacted people advocating for the well-being of people affected or at-risk of being affected by carceral systems. Our work centers around restorative…
Our children oregon's mission is to be a voice and force for the common good for all oregon children, ensuring all children have the resources and opportunities they need to reach their full potential. we elevate data and the voices of…
To help empower african americans and others achieve equality in education, employment, and economic security.
Youth progress is a nonprofit organization that is licensed as a child caring agency (cca) to serve youth ages 12-25 in the custody of the oregon youth authority (oya) or the oregon department of human services (dhs). youth progress uses…
Our mission is to improve educational outcomes for children and youth from cradle to career in Central Oregon. They do this by fostering cross-sector collaboration bringing together partners from education, business, health, philanthropy,…
For reference, the grantee most central to the portfolio’s shape is Native American Youth and Family Center and the most unlike its peers is Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors Inc. 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.
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 22 years old; the field is 18. You back the established end — and your money leans older still.
The field is 20% startups (under 5 years old) — 2% of your grantees by number, and just 0% of your money.
The orgs you fund almost never close — 2% lost their exemption, against 11% 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.
53 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. 53 of the 94 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 OREGON COMMUNITY FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds YOUTH ORGANIZED & UNITED HELP ↗
- Who funds LEARN FRESH EDUCATION CO ↗
- Who funds WORD IS BOND ↗
- Who funds ALBINA VISION TRUST INC ↗
- Who funds BOYS AND GIRLS CLUBS OF PORTLAND METROPOLITAN AREA ↗
- Who funds NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE & EDUC FUND INC ↗
- Who funds CHINESE PROGRESSIVE ASSOCIATION ↗
- Who funds NATIONAL BLACK JUSTICE COALITION INC ↗
- Who funds POSITIVE COACHING ALLIANCE ↗
- Who funds SEEDING JUSTICE ↗
- Who funds Nixyawii Community School ↗
- Who funds BEYOND BLACK ↗
- Who funds Alliance for Global Justice Corp ↗
- Who funds OREGON FOOD BANK ↗
- Who funds COMMON COUNSEL FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds RONALD MCDONALD HOUSE CHARITIES OF OREGON AND SOUTHWEST WASHINGTON ↗
- Who funds MAURICE LUCAS FOUNDATION ↗
- Who funds FUND FOR PORTLAND PUBLIC SCHOOLS ↗
- Who funds FRIENDS OF ZENGER FARM ↗
- Who funds KAIROSPDX ↗
- Who funds FOUR RIVERS COMMUNITY SCHOOL INC ↗
- Who funds BETTIES3SIXTY ↗
- Who funds KIDS UNLIMITED OF OREGON ↗
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: The Oregon Community Foundation · Oea Choice Trust · Meyer Memorial Trust · Schoolhouse Supplies Inc · The Collins Foundation · OCF Joseph E Weston Public Foundation · Marie Lamfrom Charitable Foundation Trust · Onpoint Community Credit Union · The Ford Family Foundation · Juan Young Trust · The Autzen Foundation · GenYOUTH Incorporated
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 Trail Blazers 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, a single department, or state — and drag the year to watch it move.
- Friends of Trees — 100% of income from government
- Hacienda Community Development Corporation — 48% of income from government
- Adelante Mujeres — 31% of income from government
- Friends of Zenger Farm — 28% of income from government
- Elevate Oregon — 28% of income from government
- Sunny Wolf Charter School — 26% of income from government
- Native American Youth and Family Center — 23% of income from government
- Oregon Food Bank — 21% of income from government
- Four Rivers Community School Inc — 20% of income from government
- Vibes Public Charter School — 19% of income from government
- Kairospdx — 19% of income from government
- National Black Justice Coalition Inc — 17% of income from government
- Latino Network — 15% of income from government
- Holla School — 15% of income from government
- Nixyawii Community School — 11% of income from government
- Eddyville Charter School — 4% of income from government
- Youth Organized & United Help — 3% of income from government
- The Oregon Community Foundation — 2% of income from government
- Womens Foundation of Oregon — 0% of income from government
- Centro Cultural of Washington County — 0% of income from government
- Seeding Justice — 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.