· Private foundation
Wells Family Charitable 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.
Read this first · the figures below need context
88% of Wells Family Charitable Foundation’s FY2022 grant dollars went to The Board Of Trustees Of The Leland Stanford Junior University, not to grantees.
Its money now reaches organizations through that sponsor, which does not report who recommended each grant. FY2022 names 0 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 it funded, over time
Every grant placed by its stated purpose and the recipient’s mission, by year, FY2017 to 2022.
Where the money goes
Grants by size, and the largest recipients.
| Recipient | Amount |
|---|---|
| Leland Stanford Junior University | $7,000,000 |
| MPTF | $1,000,000 |
Does the money reach high-need areas?
Each grant placed by the hardship in its grantee’s ZIP, against the area’s typical level.
Dollar for dollar, its grants (FY19–22) land where the poverty rate runs at 9%, against an area that typically sits at 11%. 16% of its dollars go to grantees based in above-average-need neighborhoods. Its grants skew toward lower-need ZIPs.
How this is measured
How this is measured
Who it funds again
Organizations funded in more than one year, against those funded once.
12 repeat relationships: 0 still active in FY2022, 12 since wound down; 1 grantees were first funded in FY2022 (too recent to call).
How the two cohorts compare
Organizations
Total granted
Still filing today
New vs renewed · share of each year
In FY2022, 0% of grant dollars renewed an existing relationship; $1.0M went to new ones.
Where new relationships form · theme of each grantee’s first grant
How this is measured
Backed again, and grew
- LPLA PHILHARMONIC ASSOCATION2× · 2020–2021 · $214k
- WAWallis Annenberg Center Performing Arts2× · 2017–2018 · $159k
- CCALARTS3× · 2017–2021 · $130k
Funded once
- GLGREATER LOS ANGELES ZOOLOGICAL ASSOCIATIONone grant, 2020 · $189k · revenue +19%
- CHChildren's Hospital Los Angelesgraduatedone grant, 2020 · $56k · revenue +27%
- FOFriends of Malibu Urgent Care Centerone grant, 2018 · $40k
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.
6 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. 6 of the 38 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.
Where the money sits, by cause and then by grantee
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.
How much its grantees rely on government
Each dot is one organization Wells Family Charitable Foundation funds: left to right is the share of its income from government, bottom to top the share from Wells Family Charitable Foundation. Bigger dots raise more.
How this is measured
Play a game based on Wells Family’s filings →